yAMES 

RySSELL 
LOWELL 
AND  HIS 
FRIENDS 


EDWARD 
EVERET 


JAMES   RUSSELL   LOWELL 
From  the  crayon  by  S.  W.  Rowse  in  the  possession  of  Professor  Charles  Eliot  Norto 


JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

AND  HIS  FRIENDS 


BY 


EDWARD  EVERETT  HALE 


WITH  PORTRAITS,  FACSIMILES,  AND   OTHER 
ILLUSTRATIONS 


BOSTON  AND  NEW  YORK 
HOUGHTON  MIFFLIN  COMPANY 

Cambridge 


COPYRIGHT,  1898  AND  1899,  BY  THE  OUTLOOK  COMPANY 
ALL  RIGHTS  RESERVED 


PREFACE 

WHEN  my  friend  Mr.  Howland,  of  the  "Out 
look  "  magazine,  asked  me  if  I  could  write  for  that 
magazine  a  Life  of  James  Russell  Lowell,  I  said  at 
once  that  I  could  not.  While  there  were  certain 
periods  of  our  lives  when  we  met  almost  daily,  for 
other  periods  we  were  parted,  so  that  for  many  years 
I  never  saw  him.  I  said  that  the  materials  for  any 
Life  of  him  were  in  the  hands  of  others,  who  would 
probably  use  them  at  the  proper  time. 

Then  Mr.  Rowland  suggested  that,  without  at 
tempting  anything  which  should  be  called  a  Life  of 
Mr.  Lowell,  I  might  write  for  the  "  Outlook "  a 
review,  as  it  were,  of  the  last  sixty  years  among 
literary  and  scientific  people  in  Boston  and  its 
neighborhood.  I  do  not  think  he  wanted  my  au 
tobiography,  nor  had  I  any  thought  of  preparing 
it  for  him  ;  but  he  suggested  the  book  which  is  in 
the  reader's  hands.  This  was  in  April,  1897.  I 
began  my  preparation  for  the  book  with  great  plea 
sure.  I  was  cordially  helped  by  friends  of  Lowell, 
who  opened  to  me  their  stores  of  memories  and 
papers  and  pictures ;  and  on  the  1st  of  January, 
1898,  the  first  number  of  a  series  of  twelve  was 

333905 


iv  PREFACE 

published  in  the  "  Outlook."  This  series  is  now 
collected,  with  such  additions  as  seemed  desirable, 
and  such  corrections  as  were  suggested  by  kind  and 
courteous  readers. 

I  should  like  to  acknowledge  here  personally  the 
courtesy  and  kindness  of  the  different  friends  of 
Mr.  Lowell  who  have  rendered  such  cordial  assist 
ance  ;  but  really  there  are  too  many  of  them.  In 
trying  to  prepare  a  list,  I  found  that  I  was  running 
up  far  into  the  hundreds,  and  I  will  not  therefore 
name  any  one  here.  On  another  page  the  reader 
will  see  how  largely  we  are  indebted  to  friends  of 
Mr.  Lowell  who  have  furnished  us  with  pictures. 
To  the  friends  who  have  loaned  us  letters  or  mem 
oranda  from  diaries  or  other  recollections  of  him, 
I  must  express  in  general  my  cordial  thanks. 

EDWARD  E.  HALE. 
ROXBURY,  April,  1899. 


CONTENTS 

CHAP.  PAGE 

I.  Hi8  BOYHOOD  AND  EAKLY  LIFE         .        .        .        .1 

II.  HARVARD  COLLEGE 15 

III.  LITERARY  WORK  IN  COLLEGE 25 

IV.  CONCORD 43 

V.  BOSTON  IN  THE  FORTIES      .        .        •        .        .        .  55 

VI.  THE  BROTHERS  AND  SISTERS           .        ...  70 

VII.  A  MAN  OF  LETTERS •        .78 

VIII.  LOWELL  AS  A  PUBLIC  SPEAKER       ....  102 

IX.  HARVARD  REVISITED   .        .        .        .        .        •        •  125 

X.  LOWELL'S  EXPERIENCE  AS  AN  EDITOR    .        .        .  147 

XI.  POLITICS  AND  THE  WAR 170 

XII.  TWENTY  YEARS  OF  HARVARD                                 •  192 

XIII.  MR.  LOWELL  IN  SPAIN 215 

XIV.  MINISTER  TO  ENGLAND      .        .        .        .        .        .  237 

XV.  HOME  AGAIN 262 

INDEX                        287 


viii  ILLUSTRATIONS 

FACSIMILE    CONTENTS   PAGE  OF  THE  BOSTON  MISCELLANY. 
(The  Authors'  names  are  in  the  handwriting  of  Nathan 

Hale) facing    80 

FACSIMILE  OF  LOWELL'S  LIST  OF  FRIENDS  to  whom  he  pre 
sented  copies  of  Conversations  on  the  Old  Poets.     "  The 

Don "  was  Robert  Carter facing    92 

From  the  original  MS.  owned  by  General  James  Lowell 
Carter,  Boston. 

JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL facing    96 

From  a  daguerreotype,  taken  in  Philadelphia  in  1844, 
owned  by  E.  A.  Pennock,  Boston. 

JOHN  LOWELL,  JR facing  112 

From  a  painting  by  Chester  Harding  in  the  possession  of 
Augustus  Lowell,  Boston. 
JOHN  HOLMES,  ESTES  HOWE,  ROBERT  CARTER,  AND  JAMES 

RUSSELL  LOWELL facing  114 

From  a  photograph  by  Black  owned  by  General  James 
Lowell  Carter,  Boston. 

CORNELIUS  CONWAY  FELTON facing  134 

From  a  photograph  lent  by  Miss  Mary  Sargent,  Worces 
ter,  Mass. 

ELMWOOD facing  138 

From  a  photograph. 

JAMES  T.  FIELDS facing  150 

From  the  photograph  by  Mrs.  Cameron. 

MOSES  DRESSER  PHILLIPS facing  154 

From  a  daguerreotype  kindly  lent  by  his  daughter,  Miss 
Sarah  F.  Phillips,  West  Medford,  Mass. 

OLIVER  WENDELL  HOLMES facing  158 

From  a  photograph  taken  in  1862. 

FACSIMILE    OF  A    FABLE    FOR  CRITICS   PROOF-SHEET  WITH 

LOWELL'S  CORRECTIONS facing  162 

Kindly  lent  by  Mrs.  Charles  F.  Briggs,  Brooklyn,  N.  Y. 

WILLIAM  WETMORE  STORY facing  164 

From  a  photograph  by  Waldo  Story  lent  by  Miss  Ellen 
Eldredge,  Boston. 

JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL facing  168 

From  a  photograph  taken  by  Dr.  Holmes  in  1864.     The 


ILLUSTRATIONS  ix 

print  is  signed  by  both  Holmes  and  Lowell,  and  is  kindly 
lent  by  Charles  Akers,  New  York,  N.  Y. 

SYDNEY  HOWARD  GAY facing  178 

From  a  photograph  lent  by  Francis  J.  Garrison,  Boston. 

ELMWOOD facing    182 

From  a  photograph  by  Miss  C.  E.  Peabody,  Cambridge, 
Mass. 

ROBERT  GOULD  SHAW facing  184 

From  a  photograph  lent  by  Francis  J.  Garrison,  Boston. 

WILLIAM  LOWELL  PUTNAM facing  184 

From  the  crayon  by  S.  W.  Rowse  in  the  possession  of 
Miss  Georgina  Lowell  Putnam,  Boston. 

CHARLES  RUSSELL  LOWELL facing  184 

From  the  crayon  by  S.  W.  Rowse  in  the  possession  of 
Miss  Georgina  Lowell  Putnam,  Boston. 

JAMES  JACKSON  LOWELL facing    184 

From  a  photograph  kindly  lent  by  Miss  Georgina  Lowell 
Putnam,  Boston. 

FRANCIS  JAMES  CHILD facing    186 

From  a  photograph  lent  by  Mrs.  Child. 

HENRY  WADSWORTH  LONGFELLOW facing    188 

From  a  photograph,  taken  in  1860,  lent  by  Miss  Long 
fellow. 

ASA  GRAY facing    196 

From  the  bronze  tablet  by  Augustus  St.  Gaudens  in  Har 
vard  University. 

Louis  AGASSIZ facing  198 

From  a  photograph  lent  by  Francis  J.  Garrison,  Boston. 

CHARLES  ELIOT  NORTON facing  202 

From  a  photograph  taken  in  1870. 

THE  HALL  AT  ELMWOOD facing  210 

From  a  photograph  by  Mrs.  J.  H.  Thurston,  Cambridge. 

WHITBY facing  240 

From  a  photograph  kindly  lent  by  The  Outlook  Com 
pany. 

THOMAS  HUGHES facing  258 

From  a  photograph. 


x  ILLUSTRATIONS 

WILLIAM  PAGE facing  266 

From   a  photograph    kindly  lent   by   Mrs.   Charles    F. 
Briggs,  Brooklyn,  N.  Y. 
JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL  IN  HIS  STUDY  AT  ELMWOOD  facing  268 

From  a  copyrighted  photograph  taken  in  the  spring  of 
1891  by  Mrs.  J.  H.  Thurston,  Cambridge.  This  is  probably 
the  last  picture  of  Mr.  Lowell. 

ROOM   ADJOINING   THE   LIBRARY   AT    ELMWOOD    .      .      .     facing  270 

From  a  photograph  by  Mrs.  J.  H.  Thurston,  Cambridge. 
FACSIMILE  OF  LETTER  FROM  MR.  LOWELL  TO  DR.  HALE,  No 
vember  11,  1890 facing  274 

FIRST  Two    AND    LAST    Two  STANZAS   OF  MR.   LOWELL'S 

POEM  MY  BROOK facing  284 

From  the  original  MS.  in  the  possession  of  the  Rev.  Minot 
J.  Savage,  New  York,  N.  Y. 


JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 
AND  HIS  FRIENDS 


CHAPTER  I 

HIS   BOYHOOD    AND    EARLY   LIFE 

ONE  cannot  conceive  more  fortunate  or  charming 
conditions  than  those  of  the  boyhood  and  early  edu 
cation  of  James  Russell  Lowell.  You  may  study  the 
babyhood  and  boyhood  of  a  hundred  poets  and  not 
find  one  home  like  his.  His  father,  the  Rev.  Charles 
Lowell,  was  the  minister  of  a  large  parish  in  Boston 
for  more  than  fifty  years.  Before  James  was  born, 
Dr.  Lowell  had  moved  his  residence  from  Boston  to 
Cambridge,  to  the  home  which  his  children  after 
wards  called  Elmwood.  So  much  of  Mr.  Lowell's 
poetry  refers  to  this  beautiful  place,  as  beautiful 
now  as  it  was  then,  that  even  far-away  readers  will 
feel  a  personal  interest  in  it. 

The  house,  not  much  changed  in  the  last  century, 
was  one  of  the  Cambridge  houses  deserted  by  the 
Tory  refugees  at  the  time  of  the  Revolution.  On 
the  steps  of  this  house  Thomas  Oliver,  who  lived 
there  in  1774,  stood  and  heard  the  demand  of  the 
freeholders  of  Middlesex  County  when  they  came  to 


JAMES  -RUSSELL  LOWELL 

bid  him  resign  George  the  Third's  commission.  The 
king  had  appointed  him  lieutenant-governor  of  Mas 
sachusetts  and  president  of  the  council.  But  by 
the  charter  of  the  province  councilors  were  to  be 
elected.  Thomas  Oliver  became,  therefore,  an  object 
of  public  resentment.  A  committee  of  gentlemen  of 
the  county  waited  on  him  on  the  morning  of  Sep 
tember  2,  1774,  at  this  house,  not  then  called  Elm- 
wood.  At  their  request  he  waited  at  once  on  Gen 
eral  Gage  in  Boston,  to  prevent  the  coming  of  any 
troops  out  from  town  to  meet  the  Middlesex  yeo 
manry.  And  he  was  able  to  report  to  them  in  the 
afternoon  that  no  troops  had  been  ordered,  "and, 
from  the  account  I  had  given  his  Excellency,  none 
would  be  ordered."  The  same  afternoon,  however, 
four  or  five  thousand  men  appeared,  not  from  the 
town  but  from  the  country  —  "a  quarter  part  in 
arms."  For  in  truth  this  was  a  rehearsal  for  the 
minute-men's  gathering  of  the  next  spring,  on  the 
morning  of  the  battle  of  Lexington.  They  insisted 
on  Oliver's  resignation  of  his  commission  from  the 
crown,  and  he  at  last  signed  the  resignation  they 
had  prepared,  with  this  addition:  "My  house  at 
Cambridge  being  surrounded  by  five  thousand  peo 
ple,  in  compliance  with  their  command,  I  sign  my 


name." 


But  for  Thomas  Oliver's  intercession  with  General 
Gage  and  the  Admiral  of  the  English  fleet,  the  Eng 
lish  troops  would  have  marched  to  Cambridge  that 
day,  and  Elmwood  would  have  been  the  battle 
ground  of  the  First  Encounter. 

The  state  confiscated  his  house  after  Governor 


HIS  BOYHOOD  AND  EARLY  LIFE  3 

Oliver  left  for  England.  Elbridge  Gerry,  one  of  the 
signers  of  the  Declaration,  occupied  it  afterward. 

Readers  must  remember  that  in  Cambridge  were 
Washington's  headquarters,  and  that  the  centre 
of  the  American  army  lay  in  Cambridge.  During 
this  time  the  large,  airy  rooms  of  Elmwood  were 
used  for  the  hospital  service  of  the  centre.  Three 
or  four  acres  of  land  belonged  to  the  estate.  Since 
those  early  days  a  shorter  road  than  the  old  road 
from  Watertown  to  Cambridge  has  been  cut  through 
on  the  south  of  the  house,  which  stands,  there 
fore,  in  the  midst  of  a  triangle  of  garden  and  mea 
dow.  But  it  was  and  is  well  screened  from  observa 
tion  by  high  lilac  hedges  and  by  trees,  mostly  elms 
and  pines.  It  is  better  worth  while  to  say  all  this 
than  it  might  be  were  we  speaking  of  some  other 
life,  for,  as  the  reader  will  see,  the  method  of  edu 
cation  which  was  followed  out  with  James  Russell 
Lowell  and  his  brothers  and  sisters  made  a  little 
world  for  them  within  the  confines,  not  too  narrow, 
of  the  garden  and  meadow  of  Elmwood. 

In  this  home  James  Russell  Lowell  was  born,  on 
the  22d  of  February,  1819.  There  is  more  than 
one  reference  in  his  letters  to  his  being  born  on 
Washington's  birthday.  His  father,  as  has  been 
said,  was  the  Rev.  Charles  Lowell.  His  mother  be 
fore  her  marriage  was  Harriet  Spence,  daughter  of 
Mary  Traill,  who  was  the  daughter  of  Robert  Traill, 
of  Orkney.  They  were  of  the  same  family  to  which 
Minna  Troil,  of  Scott's  novel  of  "  The  Pirate,"  be 
longs.  Some  of  us  like  to  think  that  the  second- 
sight  and  the  weird  fancies  without  which  a  poet's 


4  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

life  is  not  fully  rounded  came  to  the  child  of  Elm- 
wood  direct  by  the  blood  and  traditions  of  Norna 
and  the  Fitful  Head.  Anyway,  Mrs.  Lowell  was  a 
person  of  remarkable  nature  and  accomplishments. 
In  the  very  close  of  her  life  her  health  failed,  from 
difficulties  brought  on  by  the  bad  food  and  other 
exposure  of  desert  travel  in  the  East  with  her  hus 
band.  Those  were  the  prehistoric  days  when  trav 
elers  in  Elijah's  deserts  did  not  carry  with  them  a 
cook  from  the  Palais  Royal.  But  such  delicate 
health  was  not  a  condition  of  the  early  days  of  the 
poet's  life. 

His  mother  had  the  sense,  the  courage,  and  ex 
quisite  foresight  which  placed  the  little  boy,  almost 
from  his  birth,  under  the  personal  charge  of  a  sister 
eight  years  older.  Mrs.  Putnam  died  on  the  1st  of 
June,  1898,  loving  and  beloved,  after  showing  the 
world  in  a  thousand  ways  how  well  she  was  fitted 
for  the  privileges  and  duties  of  the  nurse,  playmate, 
companion,  philosopher,  and  friend  of  a  poet.  She 
entered  into  this  charge,  I  do  not  know  how  early  — 
I  suppose  from  his  birth.  I  hope  that  we  shall  hear 
that  she  left  in  such  form  that  they  may  be  printed 
her  notes  on  James's  childhood  and  her  care  of  it. 

Certain  general  instructions  were  given  by  father 
and  mother,  and  under  these  the  young  Mentor  was 
largely  left  to  her  own  genius  and  inspiration.  A 
daily  element  in  the  business  was  the  little  boy's 
nap.  He  was  to  lie  in  his  cradle  for  three  hours 
every  morning.  His  little  nurse,  eleven  or  twelve 
years  old,  might  sing  to  him  if  she  chose,  but  she 
generally  preferred  to  read  to  him  from  the  poets 


HIS  BOYHOOD  AND  EARLY  LIFE  5 

who  interested  her.  The  cadences  of  verse  were 
soothing,  and  so  the  little  boy  fell  asleep  every  day 
quieted  by  the  rhythm  of  Shakespeare  or  Spenser. 
By  the  time  a  boy  is  three  years  old  he  does  not  feel 
much  like  sleeping  three  hours  in  the  forenoon. 
Also,  by  that  time  this  little  James  began  to  be  in 
terested  in  the  stories  in  Spenser,  and  Mrs.  Putnam 
once  gave  me  a  most  amusing  account  of  the  strug 
gle  of  this  little  blue-eyed  fellow  to  resist  the  coming 
of  sleep  and  to  preserve  his  consciousness  so  that  he 
might  not  lose  any  of  the  poem. 

Of  course  the  older  sister  had  to  determine,  in 
doubtful  cases,  whether  this  or  that  pastime  or  occu 
pation  conflicted  with  the  general  rules  which  had 
been  laid  down  for  them.  In  all  the  years  of  this 
tender  intimacy  they  never  had  but  one  misunder 
standing.  He  was  quite  clear  that  he  had  a  right 
to  do  this ;  she  was  equally  sure  that  he  must  do 
that.  For  a  minute  it  seemed  as  if  there  were  a 
parting  of  the  ways.  There  was  no  assertion  of  au 
thority  on  her  part ;  there  could  be  none.  But  he 
saw  the  dejection  of  sorrow  on  her  face.  And  this 
was  enough.  He  rushed  back  to  her,  yielded  the 
whole  point,  and  their  one  dispute  was  at  an  end. 
The  story  is  worth  telling,  if  only  as  an  early  and 
exquisite  exhibition  of  the  profound  affection  for 
others  which  is  at  the  basis  of  Lowell's  life.  If  to 
this  loving-kindness  you  add  an  extraordinary  self- 
control,  you  have  the  leading  characteristics  of  his 
nature  as  it  appears  to  those  who  knew  him  earliest 
and  best,  and  who  have  such  right  to  know  where 
the  motives  of  his  life  are  to  be  found. 


6  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

I  am  eager  to  go  on  in  some  reminiscences  of  the 
little  Arcadia  of  Elmwood.  But  I  must  not  do  this 
till  I  have  said  something  of  the  noble  characteristics 
of  the  boy's  father.  Indeed,  I  must  speak  of  the 
blood  which  was  in  the  veins  of  father  and  son,  that 
readers  at  a  distance  from  Boston  may  be  reminded 
of  a  certain  responsibility  which  attaches  in  Massa 
chusetts  to  any  one  who  bears  the  Lowell  name. 

I  will  go  back  only  four  generations,  when  the 
Rev.  John  Lowell  was  the  Congregational  minister 
of  Newburyport,  and  so  became  a  leader  of  opinion 
in  Essex  County.  This  man's  son,  James  Lowell's 
grandfather,  the  second  John  Lowell,  is  the  Lowell 
who  as  early  as  1772  satisfied  himself  that,  at  the 
common  law,  slavery  could  not  stand  in  Massachu 
setts.  It  is  believed  that  he  offered  to  a  negro, 
while  Massachusetts  was  still  a  province  of  the 
Crown,  to  try  if  the  courts  could  not  be  made  to 
liberate  him  as  entitled  to  the  rights  of  Englishmen. 
This  motion  of  his  may  have  been  suggested  by 
Lord  Mansfield's  decision  in  1772,  in  the  Somerset 
case,  which  determined,  from  that  day  to  this  day, 
that  — 

"  Slaves  cannot  breathe  in  England  ;  if  their  lungs 
Receive  our  air,  that  moment  they  are  free  ! 
They  touch  our  country,  and  their  shackles  fall ! " 

But  in  that  year  John  Lowell  lost  his  chance.  In 
1779,  however,  he  introduced  the  clause  in  our 
Massachusetts  Bill  of  Rights  under  which  the  Su 
preme  Court  of  Massachusetts  freed  every  slave  in 
the  state  who  sought  his  freedom.  Let  me  say  in 
passing  that  some  verses  of  his,  written  when  he  was 


HIS  BOYHOOD  AND  EARLY  LIFE  7 

quite  a  young  man,  are  preserved  in  the  "  Pietas  et 
Gratulatio."  This  was  an  elegant  volume  which 
Harvard  College  prepared  and  sent  to  George  III. 
in  1760  on  his  accession  to  the  crown.  They  are 
written  with  the  exaggeration  of  a  young  man's 
verse ;  but  they  show,  not  only  that  he  had  the  ear 
for  rhythm  and  something  of  what  I  call  the  "  lyric 
swing/'  but  also  that  he  had  the  rare  art  of  putting 
things.  There  is  snap  and  epigram  in  the  lines. 
Here  they  differ  by  the  whole  sky  from  the  verses 
of  James  Russell,  who  was  also  a  great-grandfather 
of  our  poet  Lowell.  This  gentleman,  a  resident  of 
Charlestown,  printed  a  volume  of  poems,  which  is 
now  very  rare.  I  am,  very  probably,  the  only  person 
in  the  world  who  has  ever  read  it,  and  I  can  testify 
that  there  is  not  one  line  in  the  book  which  is  worth 
remembering,  if,  indeed,  any  one  could  remember  a 
line  of  it. 

John  Lowell,  the  emancipator,  became  a  judge. 
He  had  three  sons,  —  John  Lowell,  who,  without 
office,  for  many  years  led  Massachusetts  in  her  po 
litical  trials ;  Francis  Cabot  Lowell,  the  founder  of 
the  city  of  Lowell ;  and  Charles  Lowell,  the  father 
of  the  poet.  It  is  Francis  Lowell's  son  who  founded 
the  Lowell  Institute,  the  great  popular  university  of 
Boston.  It  is  Judge  John  Lowell's  grandson  who 
directs  that  institution  with  wonderful  wisdom ;  and 
it  is  his  son  who  gives  us  from  day  to  day  the  last 
intelligence  about  the  crops  in  Mars,  or  reverses  the 
opinions  of  centuries  as  to  the  daily  duties  of  Mer 
cury  and  Venus.  I  say  all  this  by  way  of  illustra 
tion  as  to  what  we  have  a  right  to  expect  of  a 


8  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

Lowell,  and,  if  you  please,  of  what  James  Russell 
Lowell  demanded  of  himself  as  soon  as  he  knew 
what  blood  ran  in  his  veins. 

In  this  connection  one  thing  must  be  said  with  a 
certain  emphasis ;  for  the  impression  has  been  given 
that  James  Russell  Lowell  took  up  his  anti-slavery 
sentiment  from  lessons  which  he  learned  from  the 
outside  after  he  left  college. 

The  truth  is  that  Wilberforce's  portrait  hung 
opposite  his  father's  face  in  the  dining-room.  And 
it  was  not  likely  that  in  that  house  people  had  for 
gotten  who  wrote  the  anti-slavery  clauses  in  the 
Massachusetts  Bill  of  Rights  only  forty  years  before 
Lowell  was  born. 

Before  he  was  a  year  old  the  Missouri  Compro 
mise  passed  Congress.  The  only  outburst  of  rage 
remembered  in  that  household  was  when  Charles 
Lowell,  the  father,  lost  his  self-control,  on  the  morn 
ing  when  he  read  his  newspaper  announcing  that 
capitulation  of  the  North  to  its  Southern  masters. 
It  took  more  than  forty  years  before  that  same 
household  had  to  send  its  noblest  offering  to  the 
war  which  should  undo  that  capitulation.  It  was 
forty-five  years  before  Lowell  delivered  the  Har 
vard  Commemoration  Ode  under  the  college  elms. 

We  are  permitted  to  publish  for  the  first  time  a 
beautiful  portrait  of  the  Rev.  Charles  Lowell  when 
he  was  at  his  prime.  The  picture  does  more  than  I 
can  do  to  give  an  impression  of  what  manner  of 
man  he  was,  and  to  account  for  the  regard,  which 
amounts  to  reverence,  with  which  people  who  knew 
him  speak  of  him  to  this  hour.  The  reader  at  a 


REV.    CHARLES   LOWELL 
From  a  painting  in  the  possession  of  Charles  Lowell,  Boston 


HIS  BOYHOOD  AND  EARLY  LIFE  9 

distance  must  try  to  imagine  what  we  mean  when 
we  speak  of  a  Congregational  minister  in  New  Eng 
land  at  the  end  of  the  last  century  and  at  the  begin 
ning  of  this.  We  mean  a  man  who  had  been  chosen 
by  a  congregation  of  men  to  be  their  spiritual 
teacher  for  his  life  through,  and,  at  the  same  time, 
the  director  of  sundry  important  functions  in  the 
administration  of  public  affairs.  When  one  speaks 
of  the  choice  of  Charles  Lowell  to  be  a  minister  in 
Boston,  it  is  meant  that  the  selection  was  made  by 
men  who  were  his  seniors,  perhaps  twice  his  age, 
among  whom  were  statesmen,  men  of  science,  leaders 
at  the  bar,  and  merchants  whose  sails  whitened  all 
the  ocean.  Such  men  made  the  selection  of  their 
minister  from  the  young  men  best  educated,  from 
the  most  distinguished  families  of  the  State. 

In  1805  Charles  Lowell  returned  from  profes 
sional  study  in  Edinburgh.  He  had  been  traveling 
that  summer  with  Mr.  John  Lowell,  his  oldest 
brother.  In  London  he  had  seen  Wilberforce,  who 
introduced  him  into  the  House  of  Commons,  where 
he  heard  Fox  and  Sheridan.  Soon  after  he  arrived 
in  Boston  he  was  invited  to  preach  at  the  West 
Church. 

This  church  was  the  church  of  Mayhew,  who  was 
the  Theodore  Parker  of  his  time.  Mayhew  was  in 
the  advance  in  the  Revolutionary  sentiment  of  his 
day,  and  Samuel  Adams  gave  to  him  the  credit  of 
having  first  suggested  the  federation  of  the  Colo 
nies  :  "  Adams,  we  have  a  communion  of  churches ; 
why  do  we  not  make  a  communion  of  states  ? " 
This  he  said  after  leaving  the  communion  table. 


10  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

In  such  a  parish  young  Charles  Lowell  preached  in 
1805,  from  the  text,  "  Rejoice  in  the  Lord  alway." 
Soon  after,  he  was  unanimously  invited  to  settle  as 
its  minister,  and  in  that  important  charge  he  re 
mained  until  he  died,  on  the  20th  of  January,  1861. 

Mr.  Lowell  was  always  one  of  those  who  inter 
preted  most  broadly  and  liberally  the  history  and 
principles  of  the  Christian  religion.  But  he  was 
never  willing  to  join  in  the  unfortunate  schism 
which  divided  the  Congregational  churches  between 
Orthodox  and  Unitarian.  He  and  Dr.  John  Pierce, 
of  Brookline,  to  their  very  death,  succeeded  in 
maintaining  a  certain  nominal  connection  with  the 
Evangelical  part  of  the  Congregational  body. 

The  following  note,  written  thirty-six  years  after 
James  Lowell  was  born,  describes  his  position  in  the 
disputes  of  "  denominationalists  "  :  — 

MY  DEAR  SIR  :  You  must  allow  me  to  say  that, 
whilst  I  am  most  happy  to  have  my  name  announced 
as  a  contributor  toward  any  fund  that  may  aid  in 
securing  freedom  and  religious  instruction  to  Kan 
sas,  I  do  not  consent  to  its  being  announced  as  the 
minister  of  a  Unitarian  or  Trinitarian  church,  in  the 
common  acceptation  of  those  terms.  If  there  is 
anything  which  I  have  uniformly,  distinctly,  and 
emphatically  declared,  it  is  that  I  have  adopted  no 
other  religious  creed  than  the  Bible,  and  no  other 
name  than  Christian  as  denoting  my  religious  faith. 
Very  affectionately  your  friend  and  brother, 

CHA.  LOWELL. 

ELMWOOD,  CAMBRIDGE, 

December  19,  1855. 


HIS  BOYHOOD  AND  EARLY  LIFE  11 

It  may  be  said  that  he  was  more  known  as  a  min 
ister  than  as  a  preacher.  There  was  no  branch  of 
ministerial  duty  in  which  he  did  not  practically  en 
gage.  His  relations  with  his  people,  from  the  be 
ginning  to  the  end,  were  those  of  entire  confidence. 
But  it  must  be  understood,  while  this  is  said,  that 
he  was  a  highly  popular  preacher  everywhere,  and 
every  congregation,  as  well  as  that  of  the  West 
Church,  was  glad  if  by  any  accident  of  courtesy  or 
of  duty  he  appeared  in  the  pulpit. 

The  interesting  and  amusing  life  by  which  the 
children  of  the  family  made  a  world  of  the  gardens 
of  Elmwood  was  in  itself  an  education.  The  garden 
and  grounds,  as  measured  by  a  surveyor,  were  only 
a  few  acres.  But  for  a  circle  of  imaginative  chil 
dren,  as  well  led  as  the  Lowell  children  were,  this  is 
a  little  world.  One  is  reminded  of  that  fine  passage 
in  Miss  Trimmers' s  "  Robins,"  where,  when  the 
four  little  birds  have  made  their  first  flight  from 
the  nest  into  the  orchard,  Pecksy  says :  "  Mamma, 
what  a  large  place  the  world  is  !  "  Practically,  I 
think,  for  the  earlier  years  of  James  Lowell's  life, 
Elmwood  furnished  as  large  a  world  as  he  wanted. 
Within  its  hedges  and  fences  the  young  people 
might  do  much  what  they  chose.  They  were  Mary, 
who  was  the  guardian ;  then  came  William ;  after 
wards  Robert,  whose  name  is  well  known  in  our  lit 
erature  ;  and  then  James.  The  four  children  were 
much  together;  they  found  nothing  difficult,  for 
work  or  for  pastime.  Another  daughter,  Rebecca, 
was  the  songstress  of  the  home ;  with  a  sweet  flexi 
ble  voice  she  sang,  in  her  childhood,  hymns,  and 


12  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

afterwards  the  Scotch  melodies  and  the  other  popu 
lar  music  of  the  day. 

The  different  parts  of  the  grounds  of  Elmwood 
became  to  these  children  different  cities  of  the 
world,  and  they  made  journeys  from  one  to  another. 
Their  elder  brother  Charles,  until  he  went  to  Exeter 
to  school,  joined  in  this  geographical  play. 

The  father  and  mother  differed  from  each  other, 
but  were  allied  in  essentials ;  they  enjoyed  the  same 
tastes  and  followed  the  same  pursuits  in  literature 
and  art.  Dr.  Lowell  was  intimate  with  Allston,  the 
artist,  whose  studio  was  not  far  away,  and  the  pro 
gress  of  his  work  was  a  matter  of  home  conversa 
tion. 

Mrs.  Putnam  told  me  that  in  "  The  First  Snow 
fall  "  would  be  found  a  reference  to  Lowell's  elder 
brother  William,  who  died  when  the  poet  himself 
was  but  five  years  old ;  another  trace  of  this  early 
memory  appears  again  in  the  poem  "  Music,"  in 
"A  Year's  Life." 

To  such  open-air  life  we  may  refer  the  pleasure 
he  always  took  in  the  study  of  birds,  their  seasons 
and  habits,  and  the  accuracy  of  his  knowledge  with 
regard  to  trees  and  wild  flowers. 

In  the  simple  customs  of  those  days,  when  one 
clergyman  exchanged  pulpits  with  another,  Dr. 
Lowell  would  drive  in  his  own  "  chaise  "  to  the  par 
sonage  of  his  friend,  would  spend  the  day  there, 
and  return  probably  on  Monday  morning.  He  soon 
found  that  James  was  a  good  companion  in  such 
rides,  and  the  little  fellow  had  many  reminiscences 
of  these  early  travels.  It  would  be  easy  to  quote 


THE   PASTURE,    ELMWOOD 


HIS  BOYHOOD  AND  EARLY  LIFE  13 

hundreds  of  references  in  his  poems  and  essays  to 
the  simple  Cambridge  life  of  these  days  before  col 
lege.  Thus  here  are  some  lines  from  the  poem 
hardly  known,  on  "  The  Power  of  Music." 

"  When,  with  feuds  like  Ghibelline  and  Guelf, 
Each  parish  did  its  music  for  itself, 
A  parson's  son,  through  tree-arched  country  ways, 
I  rode  exchanges  oft  in  dear  old  days, 
Ere  yet  the  boys  forgot,  with  reverent  eye, 
To  doff  their  hats  as  the  black  coat  went  by, 
Ere  skirts  expanding  in  their  apogee 
Turned  girls  to  bells  without  the  second  e  ; 
Still  in  my  teens,  I  felt  the  varied  woes 
Of  volunteers,  each  singing  as  he  chose, 
Till  much  experience  left  me  no  desire 
To  learn  new  species  of  the  village  choir." 

So  soon  as  the  boy  was  old  enough  he  was  sent 
to  the  school  of  Mr.  William  Wells,  an  English 
gentleman  who  kept  a  classical  school  in  Cambridge, 
not  far  from  Dr.  Lowell's  house.  Of  this  school  Dr. 
Holmes  and  Mr.  Higginson  have  printed  some  of 
their  memories.  All  the  Cambridge  boys  who  were 
going  to  college  were  sent  there.  Mr.  Wells  was  a 
good  Latin  scholar,  and  on  the  shelves  of  old-fash 
ioned  men  will  still  be  found  his  edition  of  Tacitus, 
printed  •  under  his  own  eye  in  Cambridge,  and  one 
of  the  tokens  of  that  "  Renaissance  "  in  which  Cam 
bridge  and  Boston  meant  to  show  that  they  could 
push  such  things  with  as  much  vigor  and  success  as 
they  showed  in  the  fur  trade  or  in  privateering.  A 
very  good  piece  of  scholarly  work  it  is.  Mr.  Wells 
was  a  well-trained  Latinist  from  the  English  schools, 
and  his  boys  learned  their  Latin  well.  And  it  is 
worth  the  while  of  young  people  to  observe  that  in 


14  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

the  group  of  men  of  letters  at  Cambridge  and  Bos 
ton,  before  and  after  James  Lowell's  time,  Samuel 
Eliot,  William  Orne  White,  James  Freeman  Clarke, 
Charles  and  James  Lowell,  John  and  Wendell 
Holmes,  Charles  Sumner,  Wentworth  Higginson, 
and  other  such  men  never  speak  with  contempt  of 
the  niceties  of  classical  scholarship.  You  would  not 
catch  one  of  them  in  a  bad  quantity,  as  you  some 
times  do  catch  to-day  even  a  college  president,  if 
you  are  away  from  Cambridge,  in  the  mechanical 
Latin  of  his  Commencement  duty. 

But  though  the  boys  might  become  good  Latin- 
ists  and  good  Grecians,  the  school  has  not  a  savory 
memory  as  to  the  personal  relations  between  master 
and  pupils.  James  Lowell,  however,  knew  but  little 
of  its  hardships,  as  he  was  but  a  day  scholar.  Dr. 
Samuel  Eliot,  who  attended  the  school  as  a  little  boy, 
tells  me  that  Lowell  delighted  to  tell  the  boys  ima 
ginative  tales,  and  the  little  fellows,  or  many  of  them, 
took  pleasure  in  listening  to  the  more  stirring  sto 
ries.  "  I  remember  nothing  of  them  except  one, 
which  rejoiced  in  the  central  interest  of  a  trap  in 
the  playground,  which  opened  to  subterranean  mar 
vels  of  various  kinds." 


CHAPTER  II 

HARVARD    COLLEGE 

FROM  such  life,  quite  familiar  with  Cambridge 
and  its  interests,  Lowell  presented  himself  for 
entrance  at  Harvard  College  in  the  summer  of  1834, 
and  readily  passed  the  somewhat  strict  examination 
which  was  required. 

Remember,  if  you  please,  or  learn  now,  if  you 
never  knew,  that  "  Harvard  College  "  was  a  college 
by  itself,  or  "  seminary,"  as  President  Quincy  used 
to  call  it,  and  had  no  vital  connection  with  the 
law  school,  the  school  of  medicine,  or  the  divinity 
school,  —  though  they  were  governed  by  the  same 
Board  of  Fellows,  and,  with  the  college,  made  u£ 
Harvard  University.  Harvard  College  was  made  of 
four  classes,  —  numbering,  all  told,  some  two  hun 
dred  and  fifty  young  men,  of  all  ages  from  fourteen 
to  thirty-five.  Most  of  them  were  between  sixteen 
and  twenty-two.  In  this  college  they  studied  Latin, 
Greek,  and  mathematics  chiefly.  But  on  "  modern 
language  days,"  which  were  Monday,  Wednesday, 
and  Friday,  there  appeared  teachers  of  French, 
Italian,  Spanish,  German,  and  Portuguese;  and 
everybody  not  a  freshman  must  take  his  choice 
in  these  studies.  They  were  called  "  voluntaries," 
not  because  you  could  shirk  if  you  wanted  to,  for 


16  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

you  could  not,  but  because  you  chose  German  01 
Italian  or  Spanish  or  French  or  Portuguese.  When 
you  had  once  chosen,  you  had  to  keep  on  for  four 
terms.  But  as  to  college  "marks"  and  the  rank 
which  followed,  a  modern  language  was  "  worth " 
only  half  a  classical  language. 

Beside  these  studies,  as  you  advanced  you  read 
more  or  less  in  rhetoric,  logic,  moral  philosophy, 
political  economy,  chemistry,  and  natural  history,  — 
less  rather  than  more.  There  was  no  study  what 
ever  of  English  literature,  but  the  best  possible 
drill  in  the  writing  of  the  English  language.  There 
was  a  well  selected  library  of  about  fifty  thousand 
volumes,  into  which  you  might  go  on  any  week-day 
at  any  time  before  four  o'clock  and  read  anything 
you  wanted.  You  took  down  the  book  with  your 
own  red  right  hand,  and  you  put  it  back  when  you 
were  done. 

Then  there  were  three  or  four  society  libraries. 
To  these  you  contributed  an  entrance  fee,  when  you 
were  chosen  a  member,  and  an  annual  fee  of  per 
haps  two  dollars.  With  this  money  the  society 
bought  almost  all  the  current  novels  of  the  time. 
Novels  were  then  published  in  America  in  two  vol 
umes,  and  they  co-'t  more  than  any  individual  student 
liked  to  pay.  One  great  object  in  joining  a  college 
society  was  to  have  a  steady  supply  of  novels.  For 
my  part,  I  undoubtedly  averaged  eighty  novels  a 
year  in  my  college  course.  They  were  much  better 
novels,  in  my  judgment,  than  the  average  novels  of 
to-day  are,  and  I  know  I  received  great  advantage 
from  the  time  I  devoted  to  reading  them.  I  think 


HARVARD  COLLEGE  17 

Lowell  would  have  said  the  same  thing.  But  I  do 
not  mean  to  imply  that  such  reading  was  his  princi 
pal  reading.  He  very  soon  began  delving  in  the 
stores  which  the  college  library  afforded  him  of  the 
older  literature  of  England. 

You  had  to  attend  morning  chapel  and  evening 
chapel.  Half  the  year  these  offices  were  at  six  in 
the  morning  and  six  at  night.  But  as  the  days 
shortened,  morning  prayers  came  later  and  later,  — 
even  as  late  as  half  past  seven  in  the  morning,  — 
while  afternoon  prayers  came  as  early  as  quarter  past 
four,  so  that  the  chapel  need  not  be  artificially  lighted. 
On  this  it  followed  that  breakfast,  which  was  an 
hour  and  twenty  minutes  after  prayers,  might  be 
long  after  eight  in  the  morning,  and  supper  at  half 
past  four  in  the  afternoon.  This  left  enormously 
long  evenings  for  winter  reading. 

Lowell  found  in  the  government  some  interesting 
and  remarkable  men. 

Josiah  Quincy,  the  president,  had  been  the  mayor 
of  Boston  who  had  to  do  with  ordering  the  system 
and  precedents  of  its  government  under  the  new  city 
charter.  From  a  New  England  town,  governed  by 
the  fierce  democracy  of  town  meetings,  he  changed 
it  into  a  "  city,"  as  America  calls  it,  ruled  by  an 
intricate  system  of  mayor,  aldermen,  council,  school 
committee,  and  overseers  of  the  poor.  Of  a  distin 
guished  patriot  family,  Mr.  Quincy  had  been,  for 
years  of  gallant  battle,  a  leader  in  Congress  of  the 
defeated  and  disconcerted  wrecks  of  the  Federal 
party.  His  white  plume  never  went  down,  and  he 
fought  the  Southern  oligarchy  as  cheerfully  as 


18  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

Amadis  ever  fought  with  his  uncounted  enemies. 
He  was  old  enough  to  have  been  an  aide  to  Gov 
ernor  Hancock  when  Washington  visited  Boston  in 
1792.  In  Congress  he  had  defied  John  Randolph, 
who  was  an  antagonist  worthy  of  him ;  and  he  hated 
Jefferson,  and  despised  him,  I  think,  with  a  happy 
union  of  scorn  and  hatred,  till  he  died.  When  he 
was  more  than  ninety,  after  the  civil  war  began,  I 
had  my  last  interview  with  him.  He  was  rejoiced 
that  the  boil  had  at  last  suppurated  and  was  ready 
to  be  lanced,  and  that  the  thing  was  to  be  settled  in 
the  right  way.  He  said :  "  Gouverneur  Morris  once 
said  to  me  that  we  made  our  mistake  when  we 
began,  when  we  united  eight  republics  with  five 
oligarchies." 

It  is  interesting  now  to  know,  what  I  did  not 
know  till  after  his  death,  that  this  gallant  leader  of 
men  believed  that  he  was  directed,  in  important 
crises,  by  his  own  "  Daimon,"  quite  as  Socrates  be 
lieved.  In  the  choice  of  his  wife,  which  proved 
indeed  to  have  been  made  in  heaven,  he  knew  he 
was  so  led.  And,  in  after  life,  he  ascribed  some 
measures  of  importance  and  success  to  his  prompt 
obedience  to  the  wise  Daimon's  directions. 

His  wife  was  most  amiable  in  her  kind  interest  in 
the  students'  lives.  The  daughters  who  resided 
with  him  were  favorites  in  the  social  circles  of  Cam 
bridge. 

Most  of  the  work  of  the  college  was  then  done 
in  rather  dreary  recitations,  such  as  you  might  ex 
pect  in  a  somewhat  mechanical  school  for  boys 
to-day.  But  Edward  Tyrrel  Channing,  brother  of 


EDWARD   TYRREL   CHANNING 


HARVARD  COLLEGE  19 

the  great  divine,  met  his  pupils  face  to  face  and 
hand  to  hand.  He  deserves  the  credit  of  the  Eng 
lish  of  Emerson,  Holmes,  Sumner,  Clarke,  Bellows, 
Lowell,  Higginson,  and  other  men  whom  he  trained. 
Their  English  did  more  credit  to  Harvard  College, 
I  think,  than  any  other  of  its  achievements  for  those 
thirty-two  years.  You  sat,  physically,  at  his  side. 
He  read  your  theme  aloud  with  you,  —  so  loud,  if  he 
pleased,  that  all  of  the  class  who  were  present  could 
hear  his  remarks  of  praise  or  ridicule,  —  "  Yes,  we 
used  to  have  white  paper  and  black  ink ;  now  we 
have  blue  paper,  blue  ink."  I  wonder  if  Mr.  Emer 
son  did  not  get  from  him  the  oracle,  "  Leave  out  the 
adjectives,  and  let  the  nouns  do  the  fighting."  I 
think  that  is  Emerson's.  Or  whose  is  it  ? 

In  1836,  when  Lowell  was  a  sophomore,  Mr. 
Longfellow  came  to  Cambridge,  a  young  man,  to 
begin  his  long  and  valuable  life  in  the  college. 
His  presence  there  proved  a  benediction,  and,  I 
might  say,  marks  an  epoch  in  the  history  of  Har 
vard.  In  the  first  place,  he  was  fresh  from  Europe, 
and  he  gave  the  best  possible  stimulus  to  the  bud 
ding  interest  in  German  literature.  In  the  second 
place,  he  came  from  Bowdoin  College,  and  in  those 
days  it  was  a  very  good  thing  for  a  Harvard  under 
graduate  to  know  that  there  were  people  not  bred 
in  Cambridge  quite  as  well  read,  as  intelligent,  as 
elegant  and  accomplished  as  any  Harvard  graduate. 
In  the  third  place,  Longfellow,  though  he  was  so 
young,  ranked  already  distinctly  as  a  man  of  letters. 
This  was  no  broken-winded  minister  who  had  been 
made  professor.  He  was  not  a  lawyer  without 


20  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

clients,  or  a  doctor  without  patients,  for  whom  "  a 
place"  had  to  be  found.  He  was  already  known 
as  a  poet  by  all  educated  people  in  America.  The 
boys  had  read  in  their  "  First  Class  Book "  his 
"  Summer  Shower "  verses.  By  literature,  pure 
and  simple,  and  the  work  of  literature,  he  had  won 
his  way  to  the  chair  of  the  Smith  professorship  of 
modern  literature,  to  which  Mr.  George  Ticknor 
had  already  given  distinction.  Every  undergrad 
uate  knew  all  this,  and  felt  that  young  Longfellow's 
presence  was  a  new  feather  in  our  cap,  as  one  did 
not  feel  when  one  of  our  own  seniors  was  made 
a  tutor,  or  one  of  our  own  tutors  was  made  a  pro 
fessor. 

But,  better  than  this  for  the  college,  Longfellow 
succeeded,  as  no  other  man  did,  in  breaking  that 
line  of  belt  ice  which  parted  the  students  from  their 
teachers.  Partly,  perhaps,  because  he  was  so 
young ;  partly  because  he  was  agreeable  and  charm 
ing  ;  partly  because  he  had  the  manners  of  a  man 
of  the  world,  because  he  had  spoken  French  in 
Paris  and  Italian  in  Florence ;  but  chief  of  all  be 
cause  he  chose,  he  was  companion  and  friend  of  the 
undergraduates.  He  would  talk  with  them  and 
walk  with  them;  would  sit  with  them  and  smoke 
with  them.  You  played  whist  with  him  if  you  met 
him  of  an  evening.  You  never  spoke  contemp 
tuously  of  him,  and  he  never  patronized  you. 

Lowell  intimates,  however,  in  some  of  his  letters, 
that  he  had  no  close  companionship  with  Long 
fellow  in  those  boyish  days.  He  shared,  of  course, 
as  every  one  could,  in  the  little  Kenaissance,  if  one 


HARVARD  COLLEGE  21 

may  call  it  so,  of  interest  in  modern  Continental 
literature,  on  Longfellow's  arrival  in  Cambridge. 

I  cannot  remember  —  I  wish  I  could  —  whether 
it  were  Longfellow  or  Emerson  who  introduced 
Tennyson  in  college.  That  first  little,  thin  volume 
of  Tennyson's  poems,  with  "Airy,  fairy  Lillian" 
and  the  rest,  was  printed  in  London  in  1830.  It 
was  not  at  once  reprinted  in  America.  It  was 
Emerson's  copy  which  somebody  borrowed  in  Cam 
bridge  and  which  we  passed  reverently  from  hand 
to  hand.1  Everybody  who  had  any  sense  knew  that 
a  great  poet  had  been  born  as  well  as  we  know  it 
now.  And  it  is  always  pleasant  to  me  to  remember 
that  those  first  poems  of  his  were  handed  about  in 
manuscript  as  a  new  ode  of  Horace  might  have  been 
handed  round  among  the  young  gentlemen  of  Rome. 

Carlyle's  books  were  reprinted  in  America,  thanks 
to  Emerson,  as  fast  as  they  were  written.  Lowell 
read  them  attentively,  and  the  traces  of  Carlyle 
study  are  to  be  found  in  all  Lowell's  life,  as  in  the 
life  of  all  well  educated  Americans  of  his  time. 

I  have  written  what  I  have  of  Channing  and 
Longfellow  with  the  feeling  that  Lowell  would  him 
self  have  said  much  more  of  the  good  which  they 
did  to  all  of  us.  I  do  not  know  how  much  his 
clear,  simple,  unaffected  English  style  owes  to 
Channing,  but  I  am  quite  sure  that  he  would  have 
spoken  most  gratefully  of  his  teacher. 

Now  as  to  the  atmosphere  of  the  college  itself. 

1  That  copy  is  still  preserved,  —  among  the  treasures  of  Mr. 
Emerson's  library  in  Concord,  —  beautifully  bound,  for  such  was  his 
habit  with  books  which  he  specially  loved. 


22  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

I  write  these  words  in  the  same  weeks  in  which  I 
am  reading  the  life  of  Jowett  at  Oxford.  It  is 
curious,  it  is  pathetic,  to  compare  Balliol  College 
in  1836-7  with  Harvard  College  at  the  same  time. 
So  clear  is  it  that  the  impulse  and  direction  were 
given  in  Oxford  by  the  teachers,  while  with  us  the 
impulse  and  direction  were  given  by  the  boys. 
The  boys  invariably  called  themselves  "  men,"  even 
when  they  were,  as  Lowell  was  when  he  entered, 
but  fifteen  years  old. 

Let  it  be  remembered,  then,  that  the  whole  drift 
of  fashion,  occupation,  and  habit  among  the  under 
graduates  ran  in  lines  suggested  by  literature. 
Athletics  and  sociology  are,  I  suppose,  now  the 
fashion  at  Cambridge.  But  literature  was  the  fash 
ion  then.  In  November,  when  the  state  election 
came  round,  there  would  be  the  least  possible  spasm 
of  political  interest,  but  you  might  really  say  that 
nobody  cared  for  politics.  Not  five  "men"  in  col 
lege  saw  a  daily  newspaper.  My  classmate,  William 
Francis  Channing,  would  have  been  spoken  of,  I 
think,  as  the  only  Abolitionist  in  college  in  1838, 
the  year  when  Lowell  graduated.  I  remember  that 
Dr.  Walter  Channing,  the  brother  of  our  professor, 
came  out  to  lecture  one  day  on  temperance.  There 
was  a  decent  attendance  of  the  undergraduates, 
but  it  was  an  attendance  of  pure  condescension  on 
their  part. 

Literature  was,  as  I  said,  the  fashion.  The  books 
which  the  fellows  took  out  of  the  library,  the 
books  which  they  bought  for  their  own  subscription 
libraries,  were  not  books  of  science,  nor  history,  nor 


HARVARD  COLLEGE  23 

sociology,  nor  politics ;  they  were  books  of  literature. 
Some  Philadelphia  publisher  had  printed  in  one  vol 
ume  Coleridge's  poems,  Shelley's,  and  Keats's  —  a 
queer  enough  combination,  but  for  its  chronological 
fitness.  And  you  saw  this  book  pretty  much  every 
where.  At  this  hour  you  will  find  men  of  seventy 
who  can  quote  their  Shelley  as  the  youngsters  of 
to-day  cannot  quote,  shall  I  say,  their  Swinburne, 
their  Watson,  or  their  Walt  Whitman.  In  the  way 
of  what  is  now  called  science  (we  then  spoke  of  the 
moral  sciences  also)  Daniel  Treadwell  read  once  a 
year  some  interesting  technological  lectures.  The 
Natural  History  Society  founded  itself  while  Lowell 
was  in  college ;  but  there  was  no  general  interest  in 
science,  except  so  far  as  it  came  in  by  way  of  the 
pure  mathematics. 

In  the  year  1840  I  was  at  West  Point  for  the 
first  time,  with  William  Story,  Lowell's  classmate 
and  friend,  and  with  Story's  sister  and  mine.  We 
enjoyed  to  the  full  the  matchless  hospitality  of 
West  Point,  seeing  its  lions  under  the  special  care 
of  two  young  officers  of  our  own  age.  They  had 
just  finished  their  course,  as  we  had  recently  finished 
ours  at  Harvard.  One  day  when  Story  and  I  were 
by  ourselves,  after  we  had  been  talking  of  our  stud 
ies  with  these  gentlemen,  Story  said  to  me :  "  Ned, 
it  is  all  very  well  to  keep  a  stiff  upper  lip  with  these 
fellows,  but  how  did  you  dare  tell  them  that  we 
studied  about  projectiles  at  Cambridge  ?  " 

"  Because  we  did,"  said  I. 

"Did  I  ever  study  projectiles?"  asked  Story, 
puzzled. 


24  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

"  Certainly  you  did/'  said  I.  "  You  used  to  go 
up  to  Peirce  Tuesday  and  Thursday  afternoons  in 
the  summer  when  you  were  a  junior,  with  a  blue 
book  which  had  a  white  back." 

"I  know  I  did/'  said  Story;  " and  was  I  studying 
projectiles  then  ?  This  is  the  first  time  I  ever  heard 
of  it." 

And  I  tell  that  story  because  it  illustrates  well 
enough  the  divorce  between  theory  and  fact  which 
is  possible  in  education.  I  do  not  tell  it  by  way  of 
blaming  Professor  Peirce  or  Harvard  College.  Story 
was  not  to  be  an  artilleryman,  nor  were  any  of  the 
rest  of  us,  so  far  as  we  knew.  Anyway,  the  choice 
of  our  specialty  in  life  was  to  be  kept  as  far  distant 
as  was  possible. 


CHAPTER  III 

LITERARY   WORK    IN    COLLEGE 

"  HARVARDIANA,"  a  college  magazine  which  ran 
for  four  years,  belongs  exactly  to  the  period  of 
Lowell's  college  life.  Looking  over  it  now,  it  seems 
to  me  like  all  the  rest  of  them.  That  is,  it  is  as  good 
as  the  best  and  as  bad  as  the  worst. 

There  is  not  any  great  range  for  such  magazines. 
The  articles  have  to  be  short.  And  the  writers  know 
very  little  of  life.  All  the  same,  a  college  magazine 
gives  excellent  training.  Lowell  was  one  editor  of 
the  fourth  volume  of  "  Harvardiana."  I  suppose  he 
then  read  proof  for  the  first  time,  and  in  a  small  way 
it  introduced  him  into  the  life  of  an  editor,  —  a  life 
in  which  he  afterwards  did  a  great  deal  of  hard 
work,  which  he  did  extremely  well,  as  we  shall  pre 
sently  see. 

The  editorial  board  of  the  year  before,  from  whose 
hands  the  five  editors  of  the  class  of  '38  took  "  Har 
vardiana,"  was  a  very  interesting  circle  of  young 
men.  They  were,  by  the  way,  classmates  and  friends 
of  Thoreau,  who  lived  to  be  better  known  than  they ; 
but  I  think  he  was  not  of  the  editorial  committee. 
The  magazine  was  really  edited  in  that  year  entirely 
by  Charles  Hayward,  Samuel  Tenney  Hildreth,  and 
Charles  Stearns  Wheeler.  Horatio  Hale,  the  philo- 


26  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

legist,  was  in  the  same  class  and  belonged  to  the 
same  set.  He  was  named  as  one  of  the  editors. 
But  he  was  appointed  to  Wilkes's  exploring  expedi 
tion  a  year  before  he  graduated,  —  a  remarkable 
testimony,  this,  to  his  early  ability  in  the  lines  of 
study  in  which  he  won  such  distinction  afterwards. 
It  is  interesting  and  amusing  to  observe  that  his 
first  printed  work  was  a  vocabulary  of  the  language 
of  some  Micmac  Indians,  who  camped  upon  the  col 
lege  grounds  in  the  summer  of  1834.  Hale  learned 
the  language  from  them,  made  a  vocabulary,  and 
then  set  up  the  type  and  printed  the  book  with  his 
own  hand.  Hay  ward,  Hildreth,  and  Wheeler,  who 
carried  on  the  magazine  for  its  third  volume,  all 
died  young,  before  the  age  of  thirty.  Hayward  had 
written  one  or  more  of  the  lives  in  Sparks's  "  Ameri 
can  Biography,"  Wheeler  had  distinguished  himself 
as  a  Greek  scholar  here  and  in  Europe,  and  Hildreth, 
as  a  young  poet,  had  given  promise  for  what  we  all 
supposed  was  to  be  a  remarkable  future. 

To  this  little  circle  somebody  addressed  himself 
who  wanted  to  establish  a  chapter  of  Alpha  Delta 
Phi  in  Cambridge  in  1836.  Who  this  somebody 
was,  I  do  not  know.  I  wish  I  did.  But  he  came 
to  Cambridge  and  met  these  leaders  of  the  literary 
work  of  the  classes  of  '37  and  '38,  and  among  them 
they  agreed  on  the  charter  members  for  the  forma 
tion  of  the  Alpha  Delta  Phi  chapter  at  Harvard. 
The  list  of  the  members  from  the  Harvard  classes  of 
1837  and  1838  shows  that  these  youngsters  knew 
already  who  their  men  of  letters  were.  It  consists  of 
fourteen  names :  John  Bacon,  John  Fenwick  Eustis, 


LITERARY  WORK  IN  COLLEGE        27 

Horatio  Hale,  Charles  Hayward,  Samuel  Tenney  Hil- 
dreth,  Charles  Stearns  Wheeler,  Henry  Williams, 
James  Ivers  Trecothick  Coolidge,  Henry  Lawrence 
Eustis,  Nathan  Hale,  Rufus  King,  George  Warren 
Lippitt,  James  Russell  Lowell,  and  Charles  Wood 
man  Scates. 

This  is  no  place  for  a  history  of  Alpha  Delta  Phi. 
At  the  moment  when  the  Phi  Beta  Kappa  fraternity, 
the  oldest  of  the  confederated  college  societies,  gave 
up  its  secrets,  Alpha  Delta  Phi  was  formed  in  Ham 
ilton  College  of  New  York.  I  shall  violate  none  of 
her  secrets  if  I  say,  what  the  history  of  literature  in 
America  shows,  that,  in  the  earlier  days  at  least, 
interest  in  literature  was  considered  by  those  who 
directed  the  society  as  a  very  important  condition  in 
the  selection  of  its  members. 

At  Cambridge,  when  Lowell  became  one  of  its 
first  members,  there  was  a  special  charm  in  member 
ship.  Such  societies  were  absolutely  forbidden  by 
a  hard  and  fast  rule.  They  must  not  be  in  Harvard 
College.  The  existence  of  the  Alpha  Delta  chapter, 
therefore,  was  not  to  be  known,  even  to  the  great 
body  of  the  undergraduates.  It  had  no  public 
exercises.  There  was  no  public  intimation  of  meet 
ings.  In  truth,  if  its  existence  had  been  known, 
everybody  connected  with  it  would  have  been  se 
verely  punished,  under  the  college  code  of  that  day. 

This  element  of  secrecy  gave,  of  course,  a  special 
charm  to  membership.  I  ought  to  say  that,  after 
sixty  years,  it  makes  it  more  difficult  to  write  of  its 
history.  I  was  myself  a  member  in  '37,  '38,  and 
'39.  Yet;  in  a  somewhat  full  private  diary  which  I 


28  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

kept  in  those  days,  I  do  not  find  one  reference  to 
my  attendance  at  any  meeting;  so  great  was  the 
peril,  to  my  boyish  imagination,  lest  the  myrmidons 
of  the  "  Faculty  "  should  seize  upon  my  papers  and 
examine  them,  and  should  learn  from  them  any  fact 
regarding  the  history  of  this  secret  society. 

But  now,  after  sixty  years,  I  will  risk  the  ven 
geance  of  the  authorities  of  the  university.  Perhaps 
they  will  take  away  all  our  degrees,  honorary  and 
otherwise;  but  we  will  venture.  This  very  secret 
society,  after  it  was  well  at  work,  may  have  counted 
at  once  twenty  members,  —  seniors,  juniors,  and 
sophomores.  They  clubbed  their  scanty  means  and 
hired  a  small  student's  room  in  what  is  now  Holyoke 
Street,  put  in  a  table  and  stove  and  some  chairs, 
and  subscribed  for  the  English  quarterlies  and  Black- 
wood.  This  room  was  very  near  the  elegant  and 
convenient  club-house  owned  by  the  society  to-day, 
if  indeed  this  do  not  occupy  the  same  ground,  as  I 
think  it  does.  Everybody  had  a  pass-key.  It  was 
thus  a  place  where  you  could  loaf  and  be  quiet  and 
read,  and  where  once  a  week  we  held  our  literary 
meetings.  Of  other  meetings,  the  obligations  of 
secrecy  do  not  permit  me  to  speak.  One  of  my 
friends,  the  other  day,  said  that  his  earliest  recollec 
tion  of  Lowell  was  finding  him  alone  in  this  modest 
club-room  reading  some  article  in  an  English  review. 
What  happened  was  that  we  all  took  much  more 
interest  in  the  work  which  the  Alpha  Delta  provided 
for  us  than  we  did  in  most  of  the  work  required  of 
us  by  the  college. 

At  that  time  the  conventional  division  of  classes 


LITERARY  WORK  IN  COLLEGE        29 

at  Cambridge  made  very  hard  and  fast  distinctions 
between  students  of  different  classes.  Alpha  Delta 
broke  up  all  this  and  brought  us  together  as  gentle 
men  ;  and,  naturally,  the  younger  fellows  did  their 
very  best  when  they  were  to  read  in  the  presence 
of  their  seniors.  I  think,  though  I  am  not  certain, 
that  I  heard  Lowell  read  there  the  first  draft  of  his 
papers  on  Old  English  Dramatists,  which  he  pub 
lished  afterwards  in  my  brother's  magazine,  the 
"  Boston  Miscellany,"  and  which  were  the  subject 
of  the  last  course  of  lectures  which  he  delivered. 

From  this  little  group  of  Alpha  Delta  men  were 
selected  the  editors  of  "  Harvardiana  "  for  1837-38. 
I  suppose,  indeed,  that  in  some  informal  way  Alpha 
Delta  chose  them.  They  were  Eufus  King,  after^ 
wards  a  leader  of  the  bar  in  Ohio ;  George  Warren 
Lippitt,  so  long  our  secretary  of  legation  at  Vi 
enna  ;  Charles  Woodman  Scates,  who  went  into  the 
practice  of  law  in  Carolina ;  James  Russell  Lowell ; 
and  my  brother,  Nathan  Hale,  Jr.  All  of  them 
stood,  when  chosen,  in  what  we  call  the  first  half  of 
the  class.  This  meant  that  they  were  within  the 
number  of  twenty-four  students  who  had  had  honors 
at  the  several  exhibitions  up  to  that  time.  In  point 
of  fact,  twenty-four  was  not  half  the  class.  But 
that  phrase  long  existed ;  I  do  not  know  how  long. 
Practically,  to  say  of  a  graduate  that  he  was  in  "  the 
first  half  of  his  class "  meant  that  at  these  exhibi 
tions,  or  at  Commencement,  he  had  received  some 
college  honor. 

I  rather  think  that  the  average  senior  of  that 
year   approved   this   selection   of   editors,   and   he 


30  JAMES   RUSSELL  LOWELL 

would  have  said  in  a  general  way  that  King  and 
Lippitt  were  expected  to  do  that  heavy  work  of 
long  eight-page  articles  which  is  supposed  by  boys 
to  make  such  magazines  respected  among  the  gradu 
ates  ;  that  Scates  was  relied  upon  for  critical  work ; 
that  my  brother  was  supposed  to  have  inherited  a 
faculty  for  editing,  and  that  on  him  and  Lowell,  in 
the  general  verdict  of  the  class,  was  imposed  the 
privilege  of  furnishing  the  poetry  for  the  magazine 
and  making  it  entertaining.  Of  course  it  was  ex 
pected  that  their  year's  "  Harvardiana "  would  be 
better  than  those  of  any  before. 

The  five  editors  had  the  further  privilege  of  as 
suming  the  whole  pecuniary  responsibility  for  the 
undertaking.  How  this  came  out  I  do  not  know ; 
perhaps  I  never  did.  I  do  not  think  they  ever 
printed  three  hundred  copies.  I  do  not  think  they 
ever  had  two  hundred  and  fifty  subscribers.  The 
volume  contains  the  earliest  of  Lowell's  printed 
poems,  some  of  which  have  never  been  reprinted, 
and  a  copy  is  regarded  by  collectors  as  one  of  the 
exceptionally  rare  nuggets  in  our  literary  history. 

When  this  choice  of  editors  was  made,  I  lived 
with  my  brother  in  Stoughton  22.  In  September, 
at  the  time  when  the  first  number  was  published,  we 
had  moved  to  Massachusetts  27,  where  I  lived  for 
two  years.  Lowell  had  always  been  intimate  in  our 
room,  and  from  this  time  until  the  next  March  he 
was  there  once  or  twice  a  day.  Indeed,  it  was  a 
good  editor's  room,  —  we  called  it  the  best  room 
in  college;  and  all  of  them  made  it  their  head 
quarters. 


LITERARY  WORK  IN  COLLEGE  31 

Unfortunately  for  my  readers,  the  daguerreotype 
and  photograph  had  not  even  begun  in  their  bene 
volent  and  beneficent  career.  It  was  in  the  next 
year  that  Daguerre,  in  Paris,  first  exhibited  his  pic 
tures.  The  French  government  rewarded  him  for 
his  great  discovery  and  published  his  process  to  the 
world.  His  announcements  compelled  Mr.  Talbot, 
in  England,  to  make  public  his  processes  on  paper, 
which  were  the  beginning  of  what  we  now  call  pho 
tography.  I  think  my  classmate,  Samuel  Longfel" 
low,  and  I  took  from  the  window  of  this  same  room, 
Massachusetts  27,  the  first  photograph  which  was 
taken  in  New  England.  It  was  made  by  a  little 
camera  intended  for  draughtsmen.  The  picture 
was  of  Harvard  Hall,  opposite.  And  the  first  por 
trait  taken  in  Massachusetts  was  the  copy  in  this 
picture  of  a  bust  of  Apollo  standing  in  the  window 
of  the  college  library,  in  Harvard  Hall. 

The  daguerreotype  was  announced  by  Daguerre 
in  January,  1839.  He  thus  forced  W.  H.  Fox  Tal- 
bot's  hand,  and  he  read  his  paper  on  photographic 
drawings  on  January  31  of  that  year.  This  paper 
was  at  once  published,  and  Longfellow  and  I  worked 
from  its  suggestions. 

Rufus  King  afterwards  won  for  himself  distinc 
tion  and  respect  as  a  lawyer  of  eminence  in  Cin 
cinnati.  He  was  the  grandson  of  the  great  Rufus 
King,  the  natural  leader  of  the  Federalists  and  of 
the  North  in  the  dark  period  of  the  reign  of  the 
House  of  Virginia.  Our  Rufus  King's  mother  was 
the  daughter  of  Governor  Worthington,  of  Ohio. 
King  had  begun  his  early  education  at  Kenyon 


32  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

College,  but  came  to  Cambridge  to  complete  his  un 
dergraduate  course,  and  remained  there  in  the  law 
school  under  Story  and  Greenleaf.  He  then  re 
turned  to  Cincinnati,  where  he  lived  in  distinguished 
practice  in  his  profession  until  his  death  in  1891. 
"  His  junior  partners  were  many  of  them  men  in 
the  first  rank  of  political,  judicial,  and  professional 
eminence.  But  he  himself  steadily  declined  all 
political  or  even  judicial  trusts  until,  in  1874,  he 
became  a  member  of  the  Constitutional  Convention 
of  Ohio.  Over  this  body  he  presided.  He  did  not 
shrink  from  any  work  in  education.  He  was  active 
in  the  public  schools.  He  was  the  chief  workman  in 
creating  the  Cincinnati  Public  Library,  and,  as  one 
of  the  trustees  of  the  McMicken  bequest,  he  nursed 
it  into  the  foundation  of  the  University  of  Cincin 
nati.  In  1875  he  became  Dean  of  the  Faculty  of  the 
Law  School,  and  served  in  that  office  for  five  years. 
Until  his  death  he  continued  his  lectures  on  Constitu 
tional  Law  and  the  Law  of  Real  Property.  No  citi 
zen  of  Cincinnati  was  more  useful  or  more  honored." 

Lowell  was  with  Mr.  King  in  the  Cambridge  law 
school. 

Of  the  five  editors,  four  became  lawyers  —  so  far, 
at  least,  as  to  take  the  degree  of  Bachelor  of  Laws 
at  Cambridge.  The  fifth,  George  Warren  Lippitt, 
from  Rhode  Island,  remained  in  Cambridge  after  he 
graduated  and  studied  at  the  divinity  school. 

There  were  other  clergymen  in  his  class,  who 
attained,  as  they  deserved,  distinction  afterwards. 
Lowell  frequently  refers  in  his  correspondence  to 
Coolidge,  Ellis,  Renouf,  and  Washburn.  Lippitt's 


LITERARY  WORK  IN  COLLEGE        33 

articles  in  "  Harvardiana  "  show  more  maturity,  per 
haps,  than  those  of  any  of  the  others.  He  had 
entered  the  class  as  a  sophomore,  and  was  the  old 
est,  I  believe,  of  the  five.  For  ten  years,  from  1842 
to  1852,  he  was  a  valuable  preacher  in  the  Unita 
rian  church,  quite  unconventional,  courageous,  can 
did,  and  outspoken.  He  was  without  a  trace  of  that 
ecclesiasticism,  which  the  New  Testament  writers 
would  call  accursed,  which  is  the  greatest  enemy  of 
Christianity  to-day,  and  does  more  to  hinder  it  than 
any  other  device  of  Satan.  In  1852  Lippitt  sought 
and  accepted  an  appointment  as  secretary  of  lega 
tion  to  Vienna.  He  married  an  Austrian  lady,  and 
represented  the  United  States  at  the  imperial  court 
there  in  one  and  another  capacity  for  the  greater 
part  of  the  rest  of  his  life.  He  died  there  in  1891. 
Charles  Woodman  Scates,  also,  like  King  and 
Lippitt,  entered  the  class  after  the  freshman  year. 
There  was  a  tender  regard  between  him  and  Lowell. 
When  they  graduated,  Scates  went  to  South  Caro 
lina  to  study  law.  But  for  his  delicate  health,  I 
think  his  name  would  be  as  widely  known  in  the 
Southern  states  as  Rufus  King's  is  in  the  valley  of 
the  Ohio.  I  count  it  as  a  great  misfortune  that 
almost  all  of  Lowell's  letters  to  him,  in  an  intimate 
and  serious  correspondence  which  covered  many 
years,  were  lost  when  the  house  in  Germantown  was 
burned  where  he  spent  the  last  part  of  his  life. 
Fortunately,  however,  Mr.  Norton  had  made  con 
siderable  extracts  from  them  in  the  volume  of 
Lowell's  published  letters.  From  one  of  these 
letters  which  has  been  preserved,  I  copy  a  little 


34  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

poem,   which   I   believe   has   never   been    printed. 
Lowell  writes :  — 

"  I  will  copy  you  a  midnight  improvisation,  which 
must  be  judged  kindly  accordingly.  It  is  a  mere 
direct  transcript  of  actual  feelings,  and  so  far 
good :  — 

"  What  is  there  in  the  midnight  breeze 

That  tells  of  things  gone  by  ? 
Why  does  the  murmur  of  the  trees 

Bring  tears  into  my  eye  ? 
O  Night !  my  heart  doth  pant  for  thee, 
Thy  stars  are  lights  of  memory  ! 

"  What  is  there  in  the  setting  moon 

Behind  yon  gloomy  pine, 
That  bringeth  back  the  broad  high  noon 

Of  hopes  that  once  were  mine  ? 
Seemeth  my  heart  like  that  pale  flower 
That  opes  not  till  the  midnight  hour. 

"  The  day  may  make  the  eyes  run  o'er 

From  hearts  that  laden  be, 
The  sunset  doth  a  music  pour 

Round  rock  and  hill  and  tree  ; 
But  in  the  night  wind's  mournful  blast 
There  cometh  somewhat  of  the  Past. 

"  In  garish  day  I  often  feel 

The  Present's  full  excess, 
And  o'er  my  outer  soul  doth  steal 

A  deep  life-weariness. 

But  the  great  thoughts  that  midnight  brings 
Look  calmly  down  on  earthly  things. 

"  Oh,  who  may  know  the  spell  that  lies 

In  a  few  bygone  years  ! 
These  lines  may  one  day  fill  my  eyes 

With  Memory's  doubtful  tears  — 
Tears  which  we  know  not  if  they  be 
Of  happiness  or  agony. 


LITERARY  WORK  IN  COLLEGE  33 

"  Open  thy  melancholy  eyes, 

O  Night  !  and  gaze  on  me  ! 
That  I  may  feel  the  charm  that  lies 

In  their  dim  mystery. 
Unveil  thine  eyes  so  gloomy  bright 
And  look  upon  my  soul,  O  Night ! " 

"  Have  you  ever  felt  this  ?  I  have,  many  and 
many  a  time." 

Of  my  dear  brother,  Nathan  Hale,  Jr.,  I  will  not 
permit  myself  to  speak  at  any  length.  We  shall 
meet  him  once  and  again  as  our  sketch  of  Lowell's 
life  goes  on.  It  is  enough  for  our  purpose  now 
that,  though  he  prepared  himself  carefully  for  the 
bar,  and,  as  a  young  man,  opened  a  lawyer's  office, 
the  most  of  his  life,  until  he  died  in  1872,  was  spent 
in  the  work  of  an  editor.  Our  father  had  been  an 
editor  from  1809,  and  of  all  his  children,  boys  and 
girls,  it  might  be  said  that  they  were  cradled  in  the 
sheets  of  a  newspaper. 

My  brother  was  the  editor  of  the  "  Boston  Mis 
cellany  "  in  1841,  when  Lowell  and  Story  of  their 
class  were  his  chief  cooperators.  From  that  time 
forward  he  served  the  Boston  "  Advertiser,"  fre 
quently  as  its  chief ;  and  when  he  died,  he  was  one 
of  the  editors  of  "  Old  and  New,"  his  admirable 
literary  taste  and  his  delicate  judgment  presiding 
over  that  discrimination,  so  terrible  to  magazine 
editors,  in  the  accepting  or  rejecting  of  the  work 
of  contributors. 

All  of  these  five  boys,  or  young  men,  were  favor 
ite  pupils  of  Professor  Edward  Tyrrell  Channing. 
When,  in  September,  1837,  they  undertook  the 
publication  of  "  Harvardiana,"  Lowell  was  eighteen, 


36  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

Hale  was  eighteen,  Scates,  King,  and  Lippitt  but 
little  older. 

With  such  recourse  the  fourth  volume  started. 
It  cost  each  subscriber  two  dollars  a  year.  I  sup 
pose  the  whole  volume  contained  about  as  much 
"reading  matter,"  as  a  cold  world  calls  it,  as  one 
number  of  "  Harper's  Magazine."  These  young 
fellows'  reputations  were  not  then  made.  But  as 
times  have  gone  by,  the  people  who  "  do  the  maga 
zines  "  in  newspaper  offices  would  have  felt  a  certain 
wave  of  languid  interest  if  a  single  number  of 
"Harper"  should  bring  them  a  story  and  a  poem 
and  a  criticism  by  Lowell ;  something  like  this  from 
William  Story;  a  political  paper  by  Rufus  King; 
with  General  Loring,  Dr.  Washburn,  Dr.  Coolidge, 
and  Dr.  Ellis  to  make  up  the  number. 

Lowell's  intimate  relations  with  George  Bailey 
Loring  began,  I  think,  even  earlier  than  their  meet 
ing  in  college.  They  continued  long  after  his  col 
lege  life,  and  I  may  refer  to  them  better  in  another 
chapter. 

The  year  worked  along.  They  had  the  dignity 
of  seniors  now,  and  the  wider  range  of  seniors. 
This  means  that  they  no  longer  had  to  construe 
Latin  and  Greek,  and  that  the  college  studies  were 
of  rather  a  broader  scope  than  before.  It  meant 
with  these  young  fellows  that  they  took  more  lib 
erty  in  long  excursions  from  Cambridge,  which 
would  sacrifice  two  or  three  recitations  for  a  sea- 
beach  in  the  afternoon,  or  perhaps  for  an  evening 
party  twenty  miles  away. 

Young  editors  always  think  that  they  have  a  great 


NATHAN    HALE 


LITERARY  WORK  IN  COLLEGE  37 

deal  of  unpublished  writing  in  their  desks  or  port 
folios,  which  is  of  the  very  best  type,  and  which, 
"  with  a  little  dressing  over,"  will  bring  great  credit 
to  the  magazine.  Alas  !  the  first  and  second  num 
bers  always  exhaust  these  reserves.  Yet  in  the  case 
of  "  Harvardiana "  no  eager  body  of  contributors 
appeared,  and  the  table  of  contents  shows  that  the 
five  editors  contributed  much  more  than  half  the 
volume. 

Lowell's  connection  with  this  volume  ought  to 
rescue  it  from  oblivion.  It  has  a  curiously  old- 
fashioned  engraving  on  the  meagre  title-page.  It 
represents  University  Hall  as  it  then  was — before 
the  convenient  shelter  of  the  corridor  in  front  was 
removed.  "  Black  wood,"  and  perhaps  other  maga 
zines,  had  given  popularity  to  the  plan,  which  all 
young  editors  like,  of  an  imagined  conference  be 
tween  readers  and  editors,  in  which  the  editors  tell 
what  is  passing  in  the  month.  Christopher  North 
had  given  an  appetite  among  youngsters  for  this 
sort  of  thing,  and  the  new  editors  fancied  that 
"  Skilly goliana,"  such  an  imagined  dialogue,  would 
be  very  bright,  funny,  and  attractive.  But  the  fun 
has  long  since  evaporated ;  the  brightness  has  long 
since  tarnished.  I  think  they  themselves  found 
that  the  papers  became  a  bore  to  them,  and  did  not 
attract  the  readers. 

The  choice  of  the  title  "  Skillygoliana  "  was,  with 
out  doubt,  Lowell's  own.  "  Skillygolee  "  is  defined 
in  the  Century  Dictionary  in  words  which  give  the 
point  to  his  use  of  it :  "A  poor,  thin,  watery  kind 
of  broth  or  soup  .  .  .  served  out  to  prisoners  in 


38  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

the  hulks,  paupers  in  workhouses,  and  the  like;  a 
drink  made  of  oatmeal,  sugar,  and  water,  formerly 
served  out  to  sailors  in  the  British  navy." 

Here   is  a  scrap  which  must  serve  as  a  bit   of 
mosaic  carried  off  from  this  half -built  temple  :  — 

SKILL  YGOLIANA — III. 

Since  Friday  morning,  on  each  busy  tongue, 

"  Shameful  !  "  "  Outrageous  !  "  has  incessant  rung. 

But  what 's  the  matter  ?     Why  should  words  like  these 

Of  dreadful  omen  hang  on  every  breeze  ? 

Has  our  Bank  failed,  and  shown,  to  cash  her  notes, 

Not  cents  enough  to  buy  three  Irish  votes  ? 

Or,  worse  than  that,  and  worst  of  human  ills, 

Will  not  the  lordly  Suffolk  take  her  bills  ? 

Sooner  expect,  than  see  her  credit  die, 

Proud  Bunker's  pile  to  creep  an  inch  more  high. 

Has  want  of  patronage,  or  payments  lean, 

Put  out  the  rushlight  of  our  Magazine  ? 

No,  though  Penumbra  swears  "  the  thing  is  flat," 

Thank  Heaven,  taste  has  not  sunk  so  low  as  that ! 

.  .  .  Has  Texas,  freed  by  Samuel  the  great, 

Entered  the  Union  as  another  State  ? 

No,  still  she  trades  in  slaves  as  free  as  air, 

And  Sam  still  fills  the  presidential  chair, 

Rules  o'er  the  realm,  the  freeman's  proudest  hope, 

In  dread  of  naught  but  bailiffs  and  a  rope. 

.  .  .  What  is  the  matter,  then  ?     Why,  Thursday  night 

Some  chap  or  other  strove  to  vent  his  spite 

By  blowing  up  the  chapel  with  a  shell, 

But  unsuccessfully  —  he  might  as  well 

With  popgun  threat  the  noble  bird  of  Jove, 

Or  warm  his  fingers  at  a  patent  stove, 

As  try  to  shake  old  Harvard's  deep  foundations 

With  such  poor,  despicable  machinations.  .  .  . 

Long  may  she  live,  and  Harvard's  morning  star 

Light  learning's  wearied  pilgrims  from  afar  ! 

Long  may  the  chapel  echo  to  the  sound 

Of  sermon  lengthy  or  of  part  profound, 

And  long  may  Dana's  gowns  survive  to  grace 

Each  future  runner  in  the  learned  race  ! 


LITERARY  WORK  IN  COLLEGE  39 

I  believe  Lowell  afterwards  printed  among  his 
collected  poems  one  or  two  which  first  appeared  in 
"  Harvardiana."  Here  is  a  specimen  which  I  be 
lieve  has  never  been  reprinted  until  now :  — 

"  Perchance  improvement,  in  some  future  time, 
May  soften  down  the  rugged  path  of  rhyme, 
Build  a  nice  railroad  to  the  sacred  mount, 
And  run  a  steamboat  to  the  muses'  fount ! 

Fain  would  I  more  —  but  could  my  muse  aspire 
To  praise  in  fitting  strains  our  College  choir  ? 
Ah,  happy  band  !  securely  hid  from  sight, 
Ye  pour  your  melting  strains  with  all  your  might ; 
And  as  the  prince,  on  Prosper's  magic  isle, 
Stood  spellbound,  listening  with  a  raptured  smile 
To  Ariel's  witching  notes,  as  through  the  trees 
They  stole  like  angel  voices  on  the  breeze, 
So  when  some  strange  divine  the  hymn  gives  out, 
Pleased  with  the  strains  he  casts  his  eyes  about, 
All  round  the  chapel  gives  an  earnest  stare, 
And  wonders  where  the  deuce  the  singers  are, 
Nor  dreams  that  o'er  his  own  bewildered  pate 
There  hangs  suspended  such  a  tuneful  weight !  " 

From  "  A  Hasty  Pudding  Poem." 

In  the  winter  of  the  senior  year  the  class  made 
its  selection  of  its  permanent  committees  and  of  the 
orator,  poet,  and  other  officers  for  "Class  Day/' 
abeady  the  greatest,  or  one  of  the  greatest,  of  the 
Cambridge  festivals.  I  do  not  remember  that  there 
was  any  controversy  as  to  the  selection  of  either 
orator  or  poet.  It  seemed  quite  of  course  that 
James  Ivers  Trecothick  Coolidge,  now  the  Kev.  Dr. 
Coolidge,  should  be  the  orator;  and  no  opposition 
was  possible  to  the  choice  of  Lowell  as  poet. 

Some  thirty  years  later,  in  Lowell's  absence  from 
Cambridge,  I  had  to  take  his  place  as  president  of 


40  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

a  Phi  Beta  Kappa  dinner  at  Cambridge.  One  of 
those  young  friends  to  whom  I  always  give  the  pri 
vilege  of  advising  me  begged  me  with  some  feeling, 
before  the  dinner,  not  to  be  satisfied  with  "  trotting 
out  the  old  war-horses,"  but  to  be  sure  to  call  out 
enough  of  the  younger  men  to  speak  or  to  read 
verses.  I  said,  in  reply,  that  the  old  war-horses 
were  not  a  bad  set  after  all,  that  I  had  Longfellow 
and  Holmes  and  Joe  Choate  and  James  Carter  and 
President  Eliot  and  Professor  Thayer  and  Dr. 
Everett  on  my  string,  of  whom  I  was  sure.  But  I 
added,  "  The  year  Lowell  graduated  we  were  as  sure 
as  we  are  now  that  in  him  was  firstrate  poetical 
genius  and  that  here  was  to  be  one  of  the  leaders 
of  the  literature  of  the  time."  And  I  said,  "You 
know  this  year's  senior  class  better  than  I  do,  and 
if  you  will  name  to  me  the  man  who  is  going  to 
fill  that  bill  twenty  years  hence,  you  may  be  sure 
that  I  will  call  upon  him  to-morrow." 

I  like  to  recall  this  conversation  here,  because  it 
describes  precisely  the  confidence  which  we  who 
then  knew  Lowell  had  in  his  future.  I  think  that 
the  government  of  the  college,  that  "  Faculty  "  of 
which  undergraduates  always  talk  so  absurdly,  was 
to  be  counted  among  those  who  knew  him.  I  think 
they  thought  of  his  power  as  highly  as  we  did.  I 
think  they  did  all  that  they  could  in  decency  to 
bring  Lowell  through  his  undergraduate  course 
without  public  disapprobation.  President  Quincy 
would  send  for  him  to  give  him  what  we  called 
"  privates,"  by  which  we  meant  private  admonitions. 
But  Lowell  somehow  hardened  himself  to  these,  the 


LITERARY  WORK  IN  COLLEGE  41 

more  so  because  he  found  them  in  themselves  easy 
to  bear. 

The  Faculty  had  in  it  such  men  as  Quincy, 
Sparks  and  Felton,  who  were  Quincy's  successors ; 
Peirce  and  Longfellow  and  Channing,  all  of  them 
men  of  genius  and  foresight;  and  I  think  they 
meant  to  pull  Lowell  through.  In  Lowell's  case  it 
was  simply  indifference  to  college  regulations  which 
they  were  compelled  to  notice.  He  would  not  go  to 
morning  prayers.  We  used  to  think  he  meant  to 
go.  The  fellows  said  he  would  screw  himself  up 
to  go  on  Monday  morning,  as  if  his  presence  there 
might  propitiate  the  Faculty,  who  met  always  on 
Monday  night.  How  could  they  be  hard  on  him, 
if  he  had  been  at  chapel  that  very  morning !  But, 
of  course,  if  they  meant  to  have  any  discipline,  if 
there  were  to  be  any  rule  for  attendance  at  chapel, 
the  absence  of  a  senior  six  days  in  seven  must  be 
noticed. 

And  so,  to  the  horror  of  all  of  us,  of  his  nearest 
friends  most  of  all,  Lowell  was  "  rusticated,"  as  the 
old  phrase  was.  That  meant  that  he  was  told  that 
he  must  reside  in  Concord  until  Commencement, 
which  would  come  in  the  last  week  in  August.  It 
meant  no  class  poet,  no  good-by  suppers,  no  vacation 
rambles  in  the  six  weeks  preceding  Commencement. 
It  meant  regular  study  in  the  house  of  the  Kev. 
Barzillai  Frost,  of  Concord,  until  Commencement 
Day  !  And  it  meant  that  he  was  not  even  to  come 
to  Cambridge  in  the  interval. 

I  have  gone  into  this  detail  because  I  have  once 
or  twice  stumbled  upon  perfectly  absurd  stories 


42  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

about  Lowell's  suspension.  And  it  is  as  well  to  put 
your  thumb  upon  them  at  once.  Thus,  I  have 
heard  it  said  that  there  was  some  mysterious  offense 
which  he  had  committed.  And,  again,  I  have  heard 
it  said  that  he  had  become  grossly  intemperate ;  all 
of  which  is  the  sheerest  nonsense.  I  think  I  saw 
him  every  day  of  his  life  for  the  first  six  months  of 
his  senior  year,  frequently  half  a  dozen  times  a  day, 
excepting  in  the  winter  vacation.  He  lived  out  of 
college;  our  room  was  in  college,  and  it  was  a  con 
venient  loafing  place.  Now,  let  me  say  that  from 
his  birth  to  his  death  I  never  saw  him  in  the  least 
under  any  influence  of  liquor  which  could  be 
detected  in  any  way.  I  never,  till  within  five  years, 
heard  any  suggestion  of  the  gossip  which  I  have  re 
ferred  to  above.  There  is  in  the  letters  boyish 
joking  about  cocktails  and  glasses  of  beer.  But 
here  there  is  nothing  more  than  might  ordinarily 
come  into  the  foolery  of  anybody  in  college  famil 
iarly  addressing  a  classmate. 

It  is  as  well  to  say  here  that  a  careful  examin 
ation  of  the  private  records  of  the  Faculty  of  the 
time  entirely  confirms  the  statement  I  have  made 
above. 


CHAPTER  IV 

CONCORD 

CONCORD  was  then  and  is  now  one  of  the  most 
charming  places  in  the  world.  But  to  poor  Lowell 
it  was  exile.  He  must  leave  all  the  gayeties  of  the 
life  of  a  college  senior,  just  ready  to  graduate,  and 
he  must  give  up  what  he  valued  more  —  the  freedom 
of  that  life  as  he  had  chosen  to  conduct  it.  He  was 
but  just  nineteen  years  old.  And  even  to  the 
gravest  critic  or  biographer,  though  writing  after 
half  a  century,  there  seems  something  droll  in  the 
idea  of  directing  such  a  boy  as  that,  with  his  head 
full  of  Tennyson  and  Wordsworth,  provoked  that 
he  had  to  leave  Beaumont  and  Fletcher  and  Mas- 
singer  behind  him  —  to  set  him  to  reciting  every  day 
ten  pages  of  "Locke  on  the  Human  Understanding" 
in  the  quiet  study  of  the  Rev.  Barzillai  Frost.  So 
is  it,  —  as  one  has  to  say  that  Lowell  hated  Concord 
when  he  went  there,  and  when  he  came  away  he  was 
quite  satisfied  that  he  had  had  a  very  agreeable  visit 
among  very  agreeable  people. 

Concord  is  now  a  place  of  curious  interest  to  trav 
elers,  and  the  stream  of  intelligent  visitors  from  all 
parts  of  the  English-speaking  world  passes  through 
it  daily.  It  has  been  the  home,  first  of  all,  of  Emer 
son  and  then  of  the  poet  Channing,  of  Alcott,  of 


44  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

Thoreau,  of  Hawthorne,  known  by  their  writings  to 
almost  every  one  who  dabbles  in  literature.  It  has 
been  the  home  of  the  Hoars,  father  and  sons,  honored 
and  valued  in  government  and  in  law.  Two  rail 
ways  carry  the  stream  of  pilgrims  there  daily,  and 
at  each  station  you  find  two  or  three  carriages  ready 
to  take  you  to  the  different  shrines,  with  friendly, 
well-read  "  drivers  "  quite  as  intelligent  as  you  are 
yourself,  and  well  informed  as  to  the  interests  which 
bring  you  there. 

But  this  page  belongs  to  the  last  half-century. 
Lowell  went  to  a  quiet  country  village,  the  home  of 
charming  people,  and  a  type  of  the  best  social  order 
in  the  world ;  but  to  him  it  was  simply  the  place  of 
his  exile.  Dear  Charles  Brooks  of  Newport,  who 
loved  every  grain  of  its  sand  and  every  drop  of  its 
spray,  used  to  say  that  St.  John  hated  Patrnos  only 
because  it  was  his  prison.  He  used  to  say  that  John 
wrote  of  heaven,  "  There  shall  be  no  more  sea,"  only 
that  he  might  say,  There  shall  be  no  chains  there ; 
all  men  shall  be  free.  Lowell  looked  on  Concord  as 
St.  John  looked  on  the  loveliness  of  Patmos.  His 
boyish  letters  of  the  time  steadily  called  it  his  prison 
or  the  place  of  his  exile. 

He  was  consigned,  as  has  been  said,  to  the  over 
sight  and  tuition  of  the  Rev.  Barzillai  Frost,  in  whose 
house  he  was  to  make  his  home.  Mr.  Frost  was  a 
scholar  unusually  well  read,  who  had  been  an  in 
structor  in  history  in  Harvard  College,  where  he 
graduated  in  the  year  1830.  In  our  own  time  people 
are  apt  to  say  that  Parson  Wilbur,  of  the  "  Biglow 
Papers,"  represents  Mr.  Frost.  I  do  not  recollect  that 


CONCORD  45 

this  was  said  when  they  were  published.  But  I  dare 
say  that  the  little  details  of  Parson  Wilbur's  life,  the 
constant  reference  to  the  College  Triennial  Catalogue 
and  other  such  machinery,  may  have  come  from  the 
simple  arrangements  of  the  Concord  parsonage.  Mr. 
Frost  had  no  sense  of  congruity.  He  would  connect 
in  the  same  sentence  some  very  lofty  thoughts  with 
some  as  absurd.  He  would  say  in  a  Thanksgiving 
sermon,  "  We  have  been  free  from  the  pestilence 
that  walketh  in  darkness,  and  the  destruction  that 
wasteth  at  noonday ;  it  is  true  that  we  have  had  some 
chicken-pox  and  some  measles." 

Imagine  the  boy  Lowell,  with  his  fine  sense  of 
humor,  listening  to  Mr.  Frost's  sermon  describing 
Niagara  after  he  had  made  the  unusual  journey 
thither.  He  could  rise  at  times  into  lofty  eloquence, 
but  his  sense  of  truth  was  such  that  he  would  not  go 
a  hair's  breadth  beyond  what  he  was  sure  of,  for  any 
effect  of  rhetoric.  So  in  this  sermon,  which  is  still 
remembered,  he  described  the  cataract  with  real  feel 
ing  and  great  eloquence.  You  had  the  mighty  flood 
discharging  the  waters  of  the  vast  lake  in  a  torrent 
so  broad  and  grand  —  and  then,  forgetting  the  pre 
cise  statistics,  he  ended  the  majestic  sentence  with 
the  words  "  and  several  feet  deep." 

Lowell  could  not  help  entering  into  conflict  with 
his  tutor,  but  they  were  both  gentlemen,  and  the 
conflicts  were  never  quarrels.  In  one  of  the  earliest 
letters  he  says :  "I  get  along  very  well  with  Barzil- 
lai  (your  orthography  is  correct),  or,  rather,  he  gets 
along  very  well  with  me.  He  has  just  gone  off  to 
Boston  to  exchange,  and  left  me  in  charge  of  the 


46  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

'  family.'  The  man's  cardinal  fault  is  that  he  de 
lights  to  hear  the  sound  of  his  own  voice.  When  I 
recite  Locke,  he  generally  spends  three  quarters  of 
the  time  in  endeavoring  to  row  up  that  delectable 
writer."  To  roi^  up,  in  the  slang  of  that  time, 
meant  to  row  an  adversary  up  the  Salt  River.  The 
phrase  was  Western.  "  Sometimes  I  think  that 
silence  is  the  best  plan.  So  I  hold  my  tongue  till 
he  brings  up  such  a  flimsy  argument  that  I  can  stand 
it,  or  sit  it,  no  longer.  So  out  I  burst,  with  greater 
fury  for  having  been  pent  up  so  long,  like  a  simmer 
ing  volcano.  However,  both  he  and  his  wife  try  to 
make  me  as  comfortable  and  as  much  at  home  as 
they  can.  ...  I  think  it  was  Herder  who  called 
Hoffman's  life  a  prolonged  shriek  of  thirty  volumes. 
Carlyle  borrowed  the  idea,  and  calls  Rousseau's  life 
a  soliloquy  of  —  so  long.  Now  I  should  call  Bar- 
zillai's  life  one  stretched  syllogism.  He  is  one  of 
those  men  who  walk  through  this  world  with  a  cursed 
ragged  undersuit  of  natural  capacity  entirely  con 
cealed  in  a  handsome  borrowed  surtout  of  other 
men's  ideas,  buttoned  up  to  the  chin." 

This  bitterness  came  in  early  in  the  exile.  In 
after  times  Lowell  could  speak  of  Mr.  Frost  more 
fairly.  In  speaking  at  Concord,  on  the  celebration 
of  the  250th  anniversary  of  the  incorporation  of  the 
town,  he  said :  — 

— ,"  In  rising  to-day  I  could  not  help  being  reminded 
of  one  of  my  adventures  with  my  excellent  tutor 
when  I  was  here  in  Concord.  I  was  obliged  to  read 
with  him  ( Locke  on  the  Human  Understanding.' 
My  tutor  was  a  great  admirer  of  Locke,  and  thought 


CONCORD  47 

that  he  was  the  greatest  Englishman  that  ever  lived, 
and  nothing  pleased  him  more,  consequently,  than 
now  and  then  to  cross  swords  with  Locke  in  argu 
ment.  I  was  not  slow,  you  may  imagine,  to  en 
courage  him  in  this  laudable  enterprise.  Whenever 
a  question  arose  between  my  tutor  and  Locke,  I 
always  took  Locke's  side.  I  remember  on  one  oc 
casion,  although  I  cannot  now  recall  the  exact  pas 
sage  in  Locke,  —  it  was  something  about  continuity 
of  ideas,  —  my  excellent  tutor  told  me  that  in  that 
case  Locke  was  quite  mistaken  in  his  views.  My 
tutor  said :  '  For  instance,  Locke  says  that  the  mind 
is  never  without  an  idea ;  now  I  am  conscious  fre 
quently  that  my  mind  is  without  any  idea  at  all.' 
And  I  must  confess  that  that  anecdote  came  vividly 
to  my  mind  when  I  got  up  on  what  Judge  Hoar 
has  justly  characterized  as  the  most  important  part 
of  an  orator's  person." 

Of  Mrs.  Frost,  then  a  young  mother  with  a  baby 
two  months  old,  he  says :  "  Mrs.  Frost  is  simply  the 
best  woman  I  ever  set  my  eyes  on.  Always  plea 
sant,  always  striving  to  make  me  happy  and  com 
fortable,  and  always  with  a  sweet  smile,  a  very 
sweet  smile !  She  is  a  jewel !  Then,  too,  I  love 
her  all  the  better  for  that  she  loves  that  husband  of 
hers,  and  she  does  love  him  and  cherish  him.  If  she 
were  not  married  and  old  enough  to  be  my  mother 
—  no  !  my  eldest  sister  —  I'd  marry  her  myself  as 
a  reward  for  so  much  virtue.  That  woman  has 
really  reconciled  me  to  Concord.  Nay !  made  me 
even  almost  like  it,  could  such  things  be." 

By  this  time,  the  15th  of  August,  the  poor  boy, 


48  JAMES  KUSSELL  LOWELL 

though  robbed  of  his  vacation,  was  coming  round 
to  see  that  there  were  few  places  in  the  world  where 
one  would  more  gladly  spend  the  summer  than  the 
Concord  of  his  time. 

But  we  must  not  look  in  the  boy's  letters  for  any 
full  appreciation  of  Mr.  Emerson.  While  he  was 
at  Concord  Mr.  Emerson  delivered  an  address  before 
the  Cambridge  divinity  school  which  challenged  the 
fury  of  conservative  divines  and  was  only  shyly  de 
fended  even  by  people  who  soon  found  out  that 
Emerson  is  the  prophet  of  our  century.  In  one  of 
Lowell's  letters  of  that  summer  written  before  that 
address  was  printed,  and  before  Lowell  had  heard 
a  word  of  it,  he  says :  "  I  think  of  writing  a  snub 
for  it,  having  it  all  cut  and  dried,  and  then  inserting 
the  necessary  extracts." 

I  need  not  say  that  this  was  mere  banter.  But 
it  shows  the  mood  of  the  day.  Privately,  and  to 
this  reader  only,  I  will  venture  the  statement  that 
if  the  most  orthodox  preacher  who  reads  the  "  Ob 
server  "  should  accidentally  "  convey  "  any  passage 
from  this  forgotten  address  into  next  Sunday's  ser 
mon  in  the  First  Church  of  Slabville,  his  hearers 
will  be  greatly  obliged  to  him  and  will  never  dream 
that  what  he  says  is  radical.  For  time  advances  in 
sermons,  and  has  its  revenges. 

Lowell  speaks  of  Mr.  Emerson  as  very  kind  to 
him.  He  describes  a  visit  to  him  in  which  Lowell 
seems  to  have  introduced  some  fellow  -  students. 
These  were  among  the  earliest  of  that  endless  train 
of  bores  who  in  forty  years  never  irritated  our  Plato. 
But,  alas !  Lowell's  letter  preserves  no  drop  of  the 


CONCORD  49 

honey  which  fell  from  Plato's  lips.  It  is  only  a 
most  amusing  burlesque  of  the  homage  rendered  by 
the  four  or  five  visitors.  I  may  say  in  passing  that 
the  characteristics  of  the  five  men  could  hardly  have 
been  seized  upon  more  vividly  after  they  had  lived 
forty  years  than  they  appear  in  the  hundred  words 
then  written  by  this  bright  boy. 
--*  In  the  address  at  Concord,  delivered  forty-seven 
years  af terward,  he  said :  — 

"  I  am  not  an  adopted  son  of  Concord.  I  cannot 
call  myself  that.  But  I  can  say,  perhaps,  that  under 
the  old  fashion  which  still  existed  when  I  was  young, 
I  was  '  bound  out '  to  Concord  for  a  period  of  time ; 
and  I  must  say  that  she  treated  me  very  kindly. 
...  I  then  for  the  first  time  made  the  acquaintance 
of  Mr.  Emerson ;  and  I  still  recall,  with  a  kind  of 
pathos,  as  Dante  did  that  of  his  old  teacher,  Bru- 
netto  Latini,  '  La  cara  e  buona  imagine  paterna,' 
'The  dear  and  good  paternal  image,'  which  he 
showed  me  here ;  and  I  can  also  finish  the  quotation 
and  say,  ( And  shows  me  how  man  makes  himself 
eternal.'  I  remember  he  was  so  kind  to  me  —  I, 
rather  a  flighty  and  exceedingly  youthful  boy  —  as 
to  take  me  with  him  on  some  of  his  walks,  partic 
ularly  a  walk  to  the  cliffs,  which  I  shall  never  for 
get.  And  perhaps  this  feeling  of  gratitude  which 
I  have  to  Concord  gives  me  some  sort  of  claim  to 
appear  here  to-day." 

Under  Barzillai's  tuition  he  settled  down  to  his 
college  work.  He  had  the  class  poem  to  write. 
As  he  was  not  to  be  permitted  to  deliver  it,  it  may 
be  imagined  that  he  did  not  write  it  with  much 


50  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

enthusiasm.  He  put  it  off,  and  he  put  it  off.  That 
was  the  way,  it  must  be  confessed,  he  sometimes 
met  such  exigencies  afterward. 

July  8  he  wrote :  "  Nor  have  I  said  anything 
about  the  poem.  I  have  not  written  a  line  since 
my  ostracism,  and,  in  fact,  doubt  very  much  whether 
I  can  write  even  the  half  of  one."  It  had  been 
proposed  that  it  should  be  read  by  some  one  else  on 
Class  Day;  but  to  this  Lowell  objected,  and  the 
faculty  of  the  college  objected  also.  On  the  23d 
he  writes :  "  As  for  the  poem,  you  will  see  the  whole 
of  it  when  it  is  printed,  as  it  will  be  as  soon  as  Scates 
gets  back  to  superintend  it.  Do  you  know,  I  am 
more  than  half  a  mind  to  dedicate  it  to  Bowen." 
Then  on  the  15th  of  August :  "  I  have  such  a  head 
ache  that  I  will  not  write  any  more  to-night,  though 
after  I  go  to  bed  I  am  in  hopes  to  finish  my  poem. 
Thinking  does  not  interfere  so  much  with  a  head 
ache  as  writing."  Then,  on  the  next  line  :  "  August 
18.  The  '  poem '  is  in  the  hands  of  the  printer.  I 
received  a  proof-sheet  to-day  from  the  6  Harvardiana ' 
press,  containing  the  first  eight  pages."  But  in  the 
same  letter  afterwards :  "  How  under  the  sun,  or, 
more  appropriately,  perhaps,  the  moon,  which  is,  or 
appears  to  be,  the  muse  of  so  many  of  the  tuneful, 
I  shall  finish  the  poem  I  don't  know.  Stearns  came 
up  here  last  Saturday,  a  week  ago  to-day,  and  stirred 
me  up  about  the  printing  of  it,  whereupon  I  began 
Sunday  to  finish  it  in  earnest,  and  straightway 
scratched  off  about  two  hundred  and  fifty  lines. 
But  now  I  have  come  to  a  dead  stand  and  am  as 
badly  off  as  ever,  without  so  much  hope.  '  Nothing 


BY     THEIR     OSTRACIZED     POET,     (SOCALLED,) 
J.    R.    L. 


Classmates,  farewell !  our  journey's  done, 

Our  mimic  life  is  ended, 
The  last  long  year  of  study 's  run, 

Our  prayers  their  last  have  blended  ! 

CHOHUS. 
Then  fill  the  cup  !  fill  high !.  fill  high  ! 

Nor  spare  the  rosy  wine  ! 
If  Death  be  in  the  cup,  we  '11  die  ! 

Such,  death  would  be  divine  ! 


Now  forward  !  onward  !  let  the  past 

In  private  claim  its  tear, 
For  while  one  drop  of  wine  shall  last, 

We  '11  have  no  sadness  here  ! 


Then  fill  the  cup  !  fill  high  !  fill  high 
Although  the  hour  be  late, 

We  '11  hob  and  nob  with  Destiny, 
And  drink  the  health  of  Fate ! 

III. 

What  though  Hl-luck  may  shake  his  fist, 

We  heed  not  him  or  his, 
We  've  booked  our  names  on  Fortune's  list, 

So  d — n  his  grouty  phiz  ! 


CHORUS. 


Then  fill  the  cup  !  fill  high  !  fill  high ! 

Let  joy  our  goblets  crown, 
We  '11  bung  Misfortune's  scowling  eye, 

And  knock  Foreboding  down ! 


rv. 


Fling  out  youth's  broad  and  snowy  sail, 

Life's  sea  is  bright  before  us  ! 
Alike  to  us  the  breeze  or  gale, 

So  hope  shine  cheerly  o'er  us  ! 

CHOHUS. 
Then  fill  the  cup  !  fill  high  !  fill  high  ! 

And  drink  to  future  joy, 
Let  thought  of  sorrow  cloud  'no  eye, 

Here  's  to  our  eldest  boy  ! 

V. 

Hurrah  !  Hurrah  !  we  're  launched  at  last, 

To  tempt  the  billows'  strife  ! 
We  Ml  nail  our  pennon  to  the  mast, 

And  DARE  the  storms  of  life ! 

CHORUS. 

TUMI  iill  the  cup  !  fill  high  once  more 
There  's  joy  on  time's  dark  wave ; 

Welcome  the  tempest's  angry  roar  ! 
T  is  music  to  the  brave. 


LOWELL'S   POEM  TO   HIS   COLLEGE  CLASS 


CONCORD  51 

so  difficult,  etc.,  etc.,  except  the  end/  you  know. 
And  here  I  am,  as  it  were,  at  the  tail  end  of  no 
thing,  and  not  a  pillow  of  consolation  whereon  to 
lay  the  aching  head  of  despair." 

These  words  are  perhaps  a  fair  enough  description 
of  the  poem.  It  has  in  it  a  good  deal  of  very  crude 
satire,  particularly  a  bitter  invective  against  aboli 
tionists  who  talked  and  did  nothing.  But  the  ode 
of  the  Cherokee  warrior,  bewailing  the  savage  trans 
fer  of  his  nation  which  had  been  consummated 
under  Andrew  Jackson's  rule,  seems  to  be  worth 
preserving.  At  the  time,  be  it  remembered,  the 
poem  was  most  cordially  received  by  the  Lilliput 
circle  of  Boston  and  Cambridge :  — 

"  Oh  abolitionists,  both  men  and  maids, 
Who  leave  your  desks,  your  parlors,  and  your  trades, 
To  wander  restless  through  the  land  and  shout  — 
But  few  of  you  could  tell  us  what  about ! 
Can  ye  not  hear  where  on  the  Southern  breeze 
Swells  the  last  wailing  of  the  Cherokees  ? 
Hark  !  the  sad  Indian  sighs  a  last  adieu 
To  scenes  which  memory  gilds  with  brighter  hue, 
The  giant  trees  whose  hoary  branches  keep 
Their  quiet  vigil  where  his  fathers  sleep, 
'Neath  the  green  sod  upon  whose  peaceful  breast 
He  too  had  hoped  to  lay  him  down  to  rest  — 
The  woods  through  whose  dark  shades,  unknown  to  fear, 
He  roamed  as  freely  as  the  bounding  deer, 
The  streams  so  well  his  boyish  footsteps  knew, 
Pleased  with  the  tossings  of  the  mock  canoe, 
And  the  vast  mountains,  round  whose  foreheads  proud 
Curled  the  dark  grandeur  of  the  roaming  cloud, 
From  whose  unfathomed  breast  he  oft  has  heard 
In  thunder-tones  the  good  Great  Spirit's  word. 
Lo,  where  he  stands  upon  yon  towering  peak 
That  echoes  with  the  startled  eagle's  shriek, 
His  scalp-tuft  floating  wildly  to  the  gale 
Which  howls  an  answer  to  his  mournful  wail, 


52  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

Leaning  his  arm  upon  an  unbent  bow, 
He  thus  begins  in  accents  sad  and  low  : 

"  '  We  must  go  !  for  already  more  near  and  more  near 
The  tramp  of  the  paleface  falls  thick  on  the  ear  — 
Like  the  roar  of  the  blast  when  the  storm-spirit  comes 
In  the  clang  of  the  trumps  and  the  death-rolling  drums. 
Farewell  to  the  spot  where  the  pine-trees  are  sighing 
O'er  the  flowery  turf  where  our  fathers  are  lying  ! 
Farewell  to  the  forests  our  young  hunters  love, 
We  shall  soon  chase  the  deer  with  our  fathers  above  ! 

"  '  We  must  go  !  and  no  more  shall  our  council-fires  glance 
On  the  senate  of  chiefs  or  the  warriors'  dance, 
No  more  in  its  light  shall  youth's  eagle  eye  gleam, 
Or  the  glazed  eye  of  age  become  young  in  its  beam. 
Wail !  wail  !  for  our  nation  ;  its  glory  is  o'er, 
These  hills  with  our  war-songs  shall  echo  no  more, 
And  the  eyes  of  our  bravest  no  more  shall  look  bright 
As  they  hear  of  the  deeds  of  their  fathers  in  fight ! 

"  '  In  the  home  of  our  sires  we  have  lingered  our  last, 
Our  death-song  is  swelling  the  moan  of  the  blast, 
Yet  to  each  hallowed  spot  clings  fond  memory  still, 
Like  the  mist  that  makes  lovely  yon  far  distant  hill. 
The  eyes  of  our  maidens  are  heavy  with  weeping, 
The  fire  'neath  the  brow  of  our  young  men  is  sleeping, 
And  the  half-broken  hearts  of  the  aged  are  swelling, 
As  the  smoke  curls  its  last  round  their  desolate  dwelling ! 

"  '  We  must  go  !  but  the  waitings  ye  wring  from  us  here 
Shall  crowd  your  foul  prayers  from  the  Great  Spirit's  ear, 
And  when  ye  pray  for  mercy,  remember  that  Heaven 
Will  forgive  (so  ye  taught  us)  as  ye  have  forgiven  ! 
Ay,  slay  !  and  our  souls  on  the  pinions  of  prayer 
Shall  mount  freely  to  Heaven  and  seek  justice  there, 
For  the  flame  of  our  wigwams  points  sadly  on  high 
To  the  sole  path  of  mercy  ye  've  left  us  —  to  die  ! 

"  *  God's  glad  sun  shone  as  warm  on  our  once  peaceful  homes 
As  when  gilding  the  pomp  of  your  proud  swelling  domes, 
And  His  wind  sang  a  pleasanter  song  to  the  trees 
Than  when  rustling  the  silk  in  your  temples  of  ease  ; 


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CONCORD  63 

For  He  judges  not  souls  by  their  flesh-garment's  hue, 
And  His  heart  is  as  open  for  us  as  for  you  ; 
Though  He  fashioned  the  Redman  of  duskier  skin, 
Yet  the  Paleface's  breast  is  far  darker  within  ! 

M  *  We  are  gone  !  the  proud  Redman  hath  melted  like  snow 
From  the  soil  that  is  tracked  by  the  foot  of  his  foe  ; 
Like  a  summer  cloud  spreading  its  sails  to  the  wind, 
We  shall  vanish  and  leave  not  a  shadow  behind. 
The  blue  old  Pacific  roars  loud  for  his  prey, 
As  he  taunts  the  tall  cliffs  with  his  glittering  spray, 
And  the  sun  of  our  glory  sinks  fast  to  his  rest, 
All  darkly  and  dim  in  the  clouds  of  the  west ! ' 

"  The  cadence  ends,  and  where  the  Indian  stood 
The  rock  looks  calmly  down  on  lake  and  wood, 
Meet  emblem  of  that  lone  and  haughty  race 
Whose  strength  hath  passed  in  sorrow  from  its  place." 

*"  The  exile  ended  with  the  last  week  in  August. 
"  I  shall  be  coming  down  next  week,  Thursday  or 
Friday  at  farthest." 

Commencement  fell  that  year  on  the  29th  of 
August,  and  Lowell  received  his  degree  of  Bachelor 
of  Arts  with  the  rest  of  his  class. 

I  believe  it  is  fair  to  tell  an  anecdote  here  of  that 
summer,  because  the  one  person  who  could  be  of 
fended  by  it  is  himself  the  only  authority  for  it, 
and  he  used  to  tell  the  story  with  great  personal 
gusto. 

This  cynic  was  in  Rome  that  spring,  where  Dr. 
Lowell  and  Mrs.  Lowell  had  been  spending  the 
winter.  Indeed,  I  suppose  if  Dr.  Lowell  had  been 
in  Cambridge,  the  episode  of  rustication  in  Concord 
would  never  have  come  into  his  son's  life.  The 
cynic  was  one  of  those  men  who  seem  to  like  to  say 
disagreeable  things  whenever  they  can,  and  he  thus 


54  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

described,  I  think  in  print,  a  visit  he  made  to  Dr. 
Lowell :  — 

"  Dr.  Lowell  had  not  received  his  letters  from 
Boston,  and  I  had  mine;  so  I  thought  I  would  go 
and  tell  him  the  Boston  news.  I  told  him  that  the 
parts  for  Commencement  were  assigned,  and  that 
Kuf  us  Ellis  was  the  first  scholar  and  was  to  have  the 
oration.  But  I  told  him  that  his  son,  James  Lowell, 
had  been  rusticated  and  would  not  return  to  Cam 
bridge  until  Commencement  week !  And  I  told 
him  that  the  class  had  chosen  James  their  class 
poet.  ( Oh  dear  ! '  said  Dr.  Lowell,  ( James  pro 
mised  me  that  he  would  quit  writing  poetry  and 
would  go  to  work/  ' 

I  am  afraid  that  most  fathers,  even  at  the  end  of 
this  century,  would  be  glad  to  receive  such  a  pro 
mise  from  a  son.  In  this  case,  James  Lowell  cer 
tainly  went  to  work,  but,  fortunately  for  the  rest  of 
us,  he  did  not  "  quit  writing  poetry." 


CHAPTER  V 

BOSTON   IN   THE   FORTIES 

I  DESPAIR  of  making  any  person  appreciate  the 
ferment  in  which  any  young  person  moved  who 
came  into  the  daily  life  of  Boston  in  the  days  when 
Lowell  left  college.  I  have  tried  more  than  once, 
and  without  the  slightest  success.  But  this  reader 
must  believe  me  that  nobody  was  "  indifferent " 
then,  even  if  he  do  not  understand  why. 

Here  was  a  little  community,  even  quaint  in  some 
of  its  customs,  sure  of  itself,  and  confident  in  its 
future.  Generally  speaking,  the  men  and  women 
who  lived  in  it  were  of  the  old  Puritan  stock.  This 
means  that  they  lived  to  the  glory  of  God,  with  the 
definite  public  spirit  which  belongs  to  such  life. 
They  had,  therefore,  absolute  confidence  that  God's 
kingdom  was  to  come,  and  they  saw  no  reason  why 
it  should  not  come  soon.  There  were  still  some 
people,  and  one  or  two  teachers  in  the  pulpit  and  in 
what  is  technically  called  the  religious  press,  who 
believed,  or  said  they  believed,  that  all  men  are  born 
in  sin  and  are  incapable  of  good.  But  practically, 
and  in  general,  the  people  of  Boston  believed  in  the 
infinite  capacity  of  human  nature,  and  they  knew 
"  salvation 's  free,"  and  "  free  for  you  and  me." 

As  a  direct  result  of  this  belief,  and  of  the  cos- 


56  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

mopolitan  habit  which  comes  to  people  who  send 
their  ships  all  over  the  world,  the  leaders  of  this  lit 
tle  community  attempted  everything  on  a  generous 
scale.  If  they  made  a  school  for  the  blind,  they 
made  it  for  all  the  blind  people  in  Massachusetts. 
They  expected  to  succeed.  They  always  had  suc 
ceeded.  Why  should  they  not  succeed  ?  If,  then, 
they  opened  a  "  House  of  Reformation,"  they  really 
supposed  that  they  should  reform  the  boys  and  girls 
who  were  sent  to  it.  Observe  that  here  was  a  man 
who  had  bought  skins  in  Nootka  Sound  and  sold 
them  in  China,  and  brought  home  silks  and  teas 
where  he  carried  away  tin  pans  and  jackknives. 
There  was  a  man  who  had  fastened  his  schooner  to 
an  iceberg  off  Labrador,  and  had  sold  the  ice  he  cut 
in  Calcutta  or  Havana.  Now,  that  sort  of  men  look 
at  life  in  its  possibilities  with  a  different  habit  from 
that  of  the  man  who  reads  in  the  newspaper  that 
stocks  have  fallen,  who  buys  them  promptly,  and 
sells  them  the  next  week  because  the  newspaper  tells 
him  that  they  have  risen. 

With  this  sense  that  all  things  are  possible  to 
him  who  believes,  the  little  town  became  the  head 
quarters  for  New  England,  and  in  a  measure  for  the 
country,  of  every  sort  of  enthusiasm,  not  to  say  of 
every  sort  of  fanaticism.  Thus,  Boston,  as  Boston, 
hated  abolitionism.  The  stevedores  and  longshore 
men  on  the  wharves  hated  a  "  nigger  "  as  much  as 
their  ancestors  in  1770  hated  a  "  lobster."  But,  all 
the  same,  Garrison  came  to  Boston  to  publish  the 
"  Liberator."  There  was  not  an  "  ism  "  but  had  its 
shrine,  nor  a  cause  but  had  its  prophet.  And,  as  in 


BOSTON  IN  THE  FORTIES  57 

the  rest  of  the  world  at  that  time,  the  madness  was 
at  its  height  which  forms  a  "  society  "  to  do  the  work 
of  an  individual.  People  really  supposed  that  if  you 
could  make  a  hundred  men  give  each  the  hundredth 
part  of  his  life  to  do  something,  the  loose  combina 
tion  would  do  more  work  than  one  stalwart  man 
would  do  who  was  ready  to  give  one  whole  life  in 
devotion  to  the  "  cause." 

The  town  was  so  small  that  practically  everybody 
knew  everybody.  "  A  town,"  as  a  bright  man  used 
to  say,  "  where  you  could  go  anywhere  in  ten  min 
utes." 

Cambridge  was  within  forty-five  minutes'  walk  of 
this  little  self-poised  metropolis,  and  was  really  a 
part  of  it,  in  all  "  its  busy  life,  its  fluctuations,  and 
its  vast  concerns  "  —  and  in  its  pettiest  concerns  as 
well. 

Lowell  could  talk  with  Wendell  Phillips,  or  ap 
plaud  him  when  he  spoke.  He  could  go  into  Gar 
rison's  printing-office  with  a  communication.  He 
could  discuss  metaphysics  or  ethics  with  Brownson. 
He  could  hear  a  Latter-Day  Church  preacher  on 
Sunday.  He  could  listen  while  Miller,  the  prophet 
of  the  day,  explained  from  Kollin's  history  and  the 
Book  of  Daniel  that  the  world  would  come  to  an 
end  on  the  twenty-first  of  March,  1842.  He  could 
lounge  into  the  "  Corner  Bookstore,"  where  James 
T.  Fields  would  show  him  the  new  Tennyson,  or 
where  the  Mutual  Admiration  Society  would  leave 
an  epigram  or  two  behind.  Or  he  could  hear  Ever 
ett  or  Holmes  or  Parsons  or  Webster  or  Silliman  or 
Walker  read  poem  or  lecture  at  the  "  Odeon."  He 


68  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

could  discuss  with  a  partner  in  a  dance  the  moral 
significance  of  the  Fifth  Symphony  of  Beethoven  in 
comparison  with  the  lessons  of  the  Second  or  the 
Seventh.  Another  partner  in  the  next  quadrille 
would  reconcile  for  him  the  conflict  of  free  will  and 
foreknowledge.  In  saying  such  things,  I  am  not 
inventing  the  instances.  I  could  almost  tell  where 
the  conversations  were  held.  At  Miss  Peabody's 
foreign  bookstore  he  could  take  out  for  a  week 
Strauss's  "  Leben  Jesu,"  if  he  had  not  the  shekels 
for  its  purchase,  as  probably  he  had  not.  Or,  under 
the  same  hospitable  roof,  he  could  in  the  evening 
hear  Hawthorne  tell  the  story  of  Parson  Moody 's 
veil,  or  discuss  the  origin  of  the  Myth  of  Ceres  with 
Margaret  Fuller.1  Or,  when  he  danced  "  the  pasto 
rale  "  at  Judge  Jackson's,  was  he  renewing  the 
memories  of  an  Aryan  tradition,  or  did  the  figure 
suggest,  more  likely,  the  social  arrangements  of  the 
followers  of  Hermann  ?  Mr.  Emerson  lectured  for 
him ;  Allston's  pictures  were  hung  in  galleries  for 
him ;  Mr.  Tudor  imported  ice  for  him ;  Fanny 
Elssler  danced  for  him,  and  Braham  sang  for  him. 
The  world  worked  for  him  —  or  labored  for  him. 
And  he  entered  into  the  labors  of  all  sorts  and  con 
ditions  of  men. 

In  one  of  his  letters  to  his  friend  Loring,  written 
in  October,  1838,  he  expresses  a  doubt  whether  he 
would  continue  his  studies  of  law.  "  I  have  been 


1  Margaret  Fuller  was  nine  years  older  than  Lowell.  A  good  deal 
of  her  early  life  was  spent  in  Cambridge;  and  his  banter  in  the  Fable 
for  Critics,  which  was  really  too  sharp,  belongs,  not  to  his  man 
hood's  serious  views,  but  to  a  boy's  humor. 


BOSTON  IN  THE  FORTIES  59 

thinking  seriously  of  the  ministry,"  he  writes ;  "  I 
have  also  thought  of  medicine  —  but  there  —  still 
worse ! "  But  on  the  9th  of  November  "  I  went 
into  town  to  look  out  for  a  place  "  —  this  means  to 
see  some  of  his  friends  "in  business/'  and  to  try 
mercantile  life  —  "  and  was  induced  en  passant  to 
step  into  the  United  States  District  Court,  where 
there  was  a  case  pending,  in  which  Webster  was  one 
of  the  counsel  retained.  I  had  not  been  there  an 
hour  before  I  determined  to  continue  in  my  profes 
sion  and  study  as  well  as  I  could."  Observe  that 
he  is  now  nineteen  years  old,  going  on  to  twenty. 

I  will  not  include  Mr.  Webster  among  the  com 
pany  of  Mr.  Lowell's  early  friends,  though  the  hour 
spent  in  the  United  States  Court  seems  to  have  been 
a  very  important  hour  in  his  life.  Who  shall  say 
what  would  have  come  had  he  "found  a  place,"  and 
begun  on  life  by  rising  early,  "  sweeping  out  the 
store,"  filling  and  trimming  the  oil  lamps,  and  then 
running  the  errands  for  some  treasurer  of  a  woolen 
factory  or  dealer  in  teas  or  spices  ?  Such  was  the 
precise  experience  of  many  of  his  young  companions 
in  college,  who  "elected,"  on  graduation,  to  "go 
into  business." 

Of  the  literary  circles  into  which  he  was  naturally 
introduced  I  will  say  something.  First,  of  some  of 
the  men  who,  in  practice,  wrote  the  "  North  Ameri 
can  Eeview  "  in  those  days  —  say  for  the  ten  years 
after  he  left  college.  Dr.  John  Gorham  Palfrey 
was  the  editor,  and  Lowell  would  have  called  the 
men  themselves  the  "  Mutual  Admiration  Society." 
Most  of  them,  I  think,  have  recognized  this  name  in 


60  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

their  own  correspondence.  It  was  a  club  of  five 
men,  who  liked  to  call  themselves  "  The  Five  of 
Clubs."  But  they  very  soon  earned  this  name  of 
the  Mutual  Admiration  Society,  which  I  think  was 
invented  for  them. 

Dr.  Palfrey  was  living  at  Cambridge  all  through 
the  period  of  Lowell's  college  and  law-school  life. 
He  had  been  a  member  of  the  divinity  Faculty  until 
1839,  and  he  assumed  the  charge  of  the  "  Review  " 
in  1835.  He  had  written  for  it  as  early  as  the  fifth 
volume.  A  gentleman  through  and  through,  of 
very  wide  information,  hospitable  and  courteous,  he 
and  the  ladies  of  his  family  made  his  house  in  Di 
vinity  Avenue  one  of  the  few  places  where  students 
of  whatever  school  of  the  college  liked  to  visit.  I 
remember  that  one  of  my  own  classmates  said, 
after  making  a  Sunday  evening  call  there,  "  Palfrey 
makes  you  think  that  you  are  the  best  fellow  in  the 
world  —  and,  by  Jove,  he  makes  you  think  that  he 
is  the  next  best !  "  He  resigned  his  professorship 
about  the  time  when  he  made  the  romantic  voyage 
by  which  he  emancipated  more  than  forty  slaves 
whom  he  had  "inherited."  Like  most  men  with 
whom  he  lived,  he  had  opposed  the  "  abolitionists  " 
with  all  his  might,  with  pen  and  with  voice.  But 
he  knew  how  to  do  the  duty  next  his  hand  better 
than  some  men  who  had  talked  more  about  theirs. 

He  was  most  kind  to  me,  boy  and  man,  and  gave 
me  instance  on  instance  which  showed  that  his  un 
flinching  firmness  in  duty  was  accompanied  with 
entire  readiness  to  recognize  the  truth  wherever  he 
found  it.  All  of  us  youngsters  were  enthusiastic 


BOSTON  IN  THE  FORTIES  61 

about  Carlyle.  All  of  the  "  oldsters  "  turned  up 
their  noses  — "  such  affectation  of  style/'  "  Ger 
manisms  picked  up  cheaply/'  and  so  on.  But  he 
said  he  knew  that  the  editor  of  the  "  North  Ameri 
can  "  must  read  the  "  French  Revolution,"  and  he 
said  that  if  you  had  to  read  a  book,  a  good  way  was 
to  take  it  as  your  only  reading  when  you  had  a  long 
journey.  Mark  that  you  could  not  then  write  books 
on  the  way,  as  I  am  writing  this. 

So  he  took  his  two  volumes  with  him  on  this 
voyage  of  emancipation.  And,  before  he  came  to 
Cincinnati,  he  had  forgotten  the  eccentricities  and 
was  as  eager  as  the  youngest  of  us  to  praise  the  his 
torian.  I  remember  as  well  how,  as  he  explained  to 
my  father  his  plans  for  the  "  North  American  Re 
view/'  he  said  he  had  secured  Emerson  to  write,  and 
that  Emerson  would  let  him  have  some  of  his  lec 
tures.  He  had  taken  care  to  provide,  however,  that 
these  were  to  be  from  the  historical  lectures  and  not 
the  speculative  ones.  If  he  had  been  pressed,  I  am 
afraid  he  would  have  been  found  to  be  of  the  large 
circle  of  those  who  in  those  days  thought  Emerson 
"  a  little  crazy." 

Under  this  chief  worked  the  Mutual  Admiration 
Society  —  all  older  than  Lowell.  But  with  all  of 
them,  sooner  or  later,  he  became  intimate.  All  of 
them  are  still  remembered :  Charles  Sumner ;  George 
Stillman  Hillard,  Sumner's  law  partner  and,  in 
earlier  days,  intimate  friend;  H.  W.  Longfellow; 
Cornelius  Con  way  Felton,  Greek  professor  at  Cam 
bridge,  and  afterwards  president  of  the  college; 
and  Henry  Russell  Cleveland.  Longfellow  knew 


62  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

that  there  were  worlds  outside  of  London  and  Edin 
burgh,  Boston  and  Cambridge,  and  their  environs. 
We  youngsters,  from  the  proud  advantage  of  the 
age  of  twenty  or  less,  would  have  said  that  the  rest 
of  the  Mutual  Admiration  Society,  in  the  year  1840, 
did  not  suspect  this. 

The  "  North  American  "  had  been  founded  after 
the  "  Monthly  Anthology  "  had  led  the  way,  twelve 
years  before.  It  was  confessedly  in  imitation  of  the 
Edinburgh  and  London  quarterlies,  as  the  London 
Quarterly  had  confessedly  imitated  the  Edinburgh. 
The  original  plan  was  a  good  one,  and  any  young 
sters  of  to-day  who  will  revive  the  old  quarterly  may 
find  that  it  meets  a  "  felt  want "  again.  Look  at  an 
old  "  Edinburgh  "  of  Brougham's  time  and  you  will 
find  an  intelligent  account  of  some  forty  books, 
which  you  will  never  read  yourself,  but  which  you 
want  to  know  about.  To  tell  the  whole  abject  and 
bottom  truth,  you  do  not  find  exactly  this  thing 
in  any  English  or  American  "  Review  "  published 
in  1898. 

The  "  North  American "  had  been  under  the 
charge  of  both  Everetts  —  Edward  and  Alexander. 
Alexander  Everett  assumed  the  editorial  direction 
on  his  return  from  Europe  in  1830,  and  from  him 
it  passed  into  Dr.  Palfrey's  hands.  I  may  say  in 
passing  that  if  I  had  at  my  bank  the  money  which 
the  Everetts  and  their  family  connections  paid  for 
establishing  this  national  journal,  with  compound 
interest  on  the  same,  I  could  be  living  to-day  in  my 
palace  at  Newport,  and  entertaining  the  Duke  of 
Edinburgh,  the  Bishop  of  London,  and  the  Vicar- 


BOSTON  IN  THE  FORTIES  63 

General  of  North  America.  Probably  I  am  better 
off  as  I  write  in  the  somewhat  dingy  Albany  station 
of  the  Delaware  and  Hudson  Railroad.  This  is  a 
parenthesis,  with  the  indulgence  of  my  readers. 

We  all  read  the  "  North  American "  regularly. 
As  I  have  implied,  we  who  were  ten  years  younger 
than  the  Mutual  Admiration  Society  made  fun  of 
it.  We  said  that  they  could  not  review  a  book  of 
poems  without  a  prefatory  essay  on  poetry.  We 
said  that  Horace  Walpole  made  their  fortune ;  that 
they  would  not  publish  a  number  without  an  article 
on  Walpole.  But  I  cannot  now  find  more  than 
three  or  four  articles  on  Walpole  or  even  his  times 
in  those  years. 

The  truth  was  that  literature  was  not  yet  a  pro 
fession.  The  men  who  wrote  for  the  "  North 
American"  were  earning  their  bread  and  butter, 
their  sheets,  blankets,  fuel,  broadcloth,  shingles,  and 
slates,  in  other  enterprises.  Emerson  was  an  excep 
tion;  and  perhaps  the  impression  as  to  his  being 
crazy  was  helped  by  the  observation  that  these 
"  things  which  perish  in  the  using  "  came  to  him  in 
the  uncanny  and  unusual  channel  of  literary  work 
manship.  Even  Emerson  printed  in  the  "North 
American  Review  "  lectures  which  had  been  deliv 
ered  elsewhere.  He  told  me  in  1849,  after  he  had 
returned  from  England,  that  he  had  then  never 
received  a  dollar  from  the  sale  of  any  of  his  own 
published  works.  He  said  he  owned  a  great  many 
copies  of  his  own  books,  but  that  these  were  all  the 
returns  which  he  had  received  from  his  publishers. 
And  Mr.  Phillips  told  me  that  when,  after  "  English 


64  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

Traits/'  published  by  him,  had  in  the  first  six 
months'  sales  paid  for  its  plates  and  earned  a 
balance  besides  in  Emerson's  favor,  Emerson  could 
not  believe  this.  He  came  to  the  office  to  explain 
to  Mr.  Phillips  that  he  wanted  and  meant  to  hold 
the  property  in  his  own  stereotype  plates.  And  Mr. 
Phillips  had  difficulty  in  persuading  him  that  he 
had  already  paid  for  them  and  did  own  them. 
Emerson  was  then  so  unused  to  the  methods  of 
business  that  Mr.  Phillips  had  also  to  explain  to 
him  how  to  indorse  this  virgin  check,  so  that  he 
could  place  it  to  his  own  bank  account. 

Mr.  Phillips,  then  of  the  firm  of  Phillips  &  Samp 
son,  was  Emerson's  near  connection  by  marriage ; 
Mrs.  Phillips,  a  charming  and  accomplished  lady, 
being  Emerson's  cousin  on  the  Haskins  side. 

To  return  to  the  "  North  American  Review."  The 
five  young  gentlemen  whom  I  have  named  were  all 
favorites  in  the  best  circles  of  the  charming  social 
life  of  that  little  Boston.  I  cannot  see  that  their 
fondness  for  each  other  can  have  much  affected 
their  work  for  the  "  North  American,"  for  whatever 
they  published  appeared  long  after  they  had  won 
their  name. 

They  were  in  the  habit  of  looking  in  at  what 
began  to  be  called  the  "  Old  Corner  Bookstore," 
which  is  still,  as  it  was  then,  an  excellent  shop,  where 
you  find  all  the  last  books,  the  foreign  magazines, 
and  are  sure  of  intelligent  attention.  The  memory 
of  modern  man  does  not  run  back  to  the  time  when 
there  was  not  a  "  bookstore  "  in  this  old  building, 
which  bears  on  its  rough-cast  wall  the  date  of  1713. 


BOSTON  IN  THE  FORTIES  65 

The  antiquarians  would  tell  us  that  on  the  same 
spot  as  early  as  1634  there  was  the  first  "  ordinary  " 
in  Boston.  And  it  was  just  above  here,  under  the 
sign  of  Cromwell's  Head,  that  Colonel  George  Wash 
ington  and  his  elegant  little  troop  made  their  home 
when  that  young  Virginian  visited  Governor  Shirley 
in  1756. 

The  Corner  Bookstore  in  that  generation  was  the 
shop  of  Allen  &  Ticknor,  and  not  long  before  there 
had  appeared  in  the  shop,  as  the  youngest  boy, 
James  T.  Fields,  from  Portsmouth,  who  was  des 
tined  to  be  the  friend  of  so  many  men  of  letters,  and 
who  has  left  behind  him  such  charming  memorials  of 
his  own  literary  life.  It  must  be  to  Fields,  I  think, 
that  we  owe  the  preservation  of  the  epigram  which 
the  Club  made  upon  "  In  Mernoriam."  I  will  not 
say  that  the  story  did  not  improve  as  it  grew  older, 
but  here  it  is  in  the  last  edition :  — 

The  firm,  then  Ticknor  &  Fields,  were  Tennyson's 
American  publishers.  They  had  just  brought  out 
"  In  Memoriam."  One  of  the  five  gentlemen  looked 
in  as  he  went  down  town,  took  up  the  book,  and 
said,  "  Tennyson  has  done  for  friendship  what  Pe 
trarch  did  for  love,  Mr.  Fields,"  to  which  Mr.  Fields 
assented ;  and  his  friend  —  say  Mr.  Hillard  —  went 
his  way.  Not  displeased  with  his  own  remark,  when 
he  came  to  his  office  —  if  it  were  Hillard  —  he  re 
peated  it  to  Sumner,  who  in  turn  repeated  it  to 
Cleveland,  perhaps,  when  he  looked  in.  Going  home 
to  lunch,  Sumner  goes  in  at  the  shop,  takes  up  the 
new  book,  and  says,  "  Your  Tennyson  is  out,  Mr. 
Fields.  What  Petrarch  did  for  love,  Tennyson  has 


66  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

done  for  friendship."  Mr.  Fields  again  assents,  and 
it  is  half  an  hour  before  Mr.  Cleveland  enters.  He 
also  is  led  to  say  that  Tennyson  has  done  for  friend 
ship  what  Petrarch  has  done  for  love ;  and  before 
the  sun  sets  Mr.  Fields  receives  the  same  suggestion 
from  Longfellow,  and  then  from  Felton,  who  have 
fallen  in  with  their  accustomed  friends,  and  look  in 
to  see  the  new  books,  on  their  way  out  to  Cam 
bridge. 

This  story  belongs,  of  course,  to  the  year  1850. 
In  1841,  when  Lowell  begins  to  be  counted  as  a 
Bostonian,  the  Corner  Bookstore  was  already  the 
centre  of  a  younger  group  of  men  who  were  earning 
for  themselves  an  honorable  place  in  American  let 
ters.  I  believe  they  were  first  brought  together  in 
the  government  of  the  Mercantile  Library  Associa 
tion.  This  association  started  in  a  modest  way  to 
provide  books  and  a  reading-room  for  merchants' 
clerks.  To  a  beginning  so  simple  this  group  of 
young  fellows,  when  hardly  of  age,  gave  dignity 
and  importance.  Under  their  lead  the  association 
established  a  large  and  valuable  lending  library, 
set  on  foot  what  were  the  most  popular  lectures  in 
Boston,  and  kept  up  a  well-arranged  reading-room. 
It  was  virtually  a  large  literary  club,  which  occupied 
a  building,  the  whole  of  which  was  devoted  to  books 
or  to  education.  With  the  passage  of  two  genera 
tions  much  of  the  work  which  the  association  thus 
took  in  hand  has  devolved  upon  the  Public  Library 
and  its  branches  and  upon  the  Lowell  Institute. 
The  Mercantile  Library  has  been  transferred  to  the 
city  and  is  administered  as  its  South  End  Branch. 


BOSTON  IN  THE  FORTIES  67 

The  winter  courses  under  the  Lowell  foundation 
take  the  place  of  the  Mercantile  courses,  so  that  this 
association  now  shows  its  existence  in  a  comfortable 
club-house  in  Tremont  Street. 

In  the  ten  years  between  1840  and  1850  it  was 
an  important  factor  in  Boston  life.  The  initiative 
in  its  work  was  given  by  James  T.  Fields,  Edwin 
Percy  Whipple,  Daniel  N.  Haskell,  Warren  Sawyer, 
Thomas  J.  Allen,  George  0.  Carpenter,  Edward 
Stearns,  and  George  Warren,  who  had  at  command 
the  ready  service  of  younger  fellows  among  their 
companions,  loyal  to  the  interests  of  the  club,  and 
keeping  up  the  best  interests  of  society  better  than 
they  knew.  The  club  engaged  Webster,  Everett, 
Choate,  Sumner,  Channing,  Emerson,  Holmes,  and 
Winthrop  to  lecture  to  them,  arranging  for  "  hono 
rariums  "  such  as  had  never  been  heard  of  before. 

The  group  of  officers  whom  I  have  named  was  in 
itself  a  little  coterie  of  young  fellows  who  were  read 
ing  and  talking  with  one  another  on  the  best  lines  of 
English  literature.  Fields  and  Whipple  soon  became 
known  to  the  public  by  their  own  printed  work.  All 
the  group  were  well  read  in  the  best  English  books 
of  the  time,  and  I  think  I  am  right  in  saying  that 
the  existence  of  such  a  group  around  him  strength 
ened  Fields's  hands,  as  he  compelled  the  firm  to 
which  he  belonged  to  introduce  in  America  some  of 
the  lesser  known  English  authors.  In  1845  Thomas 
Starr  King  removed  to  Boston.  His  rare  genius, 
insight,  and  marvelous  power  of  expression  gave  him 
a  welcome  everywhere.  In  this  little  circle  of  the 
Mercantile  Library  managers  he  was  the  intimate 
friend  of  all. 


68  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

Older  than  either  of  these  groups  of  men,  there 
was  a  set  of  careful  scholars  in  Boston  whom  I  may 
distinguish  as  the  historians.  Dr.  Palfrey  once  said 
to  me  that  it  was  a  sort  of  accident,  as  he  thought, 
which  turned  the  young  literary  men  of  Boston  so 
much  in  the  direction  of  history.  The  accident  was 
that  the  two  principal  public  libraries  before  1850 
were  the  Library  of  the  Historical  Society,  and  that 
of  the  Boston  Athenaeum,  which  was  much  larger. 
It  so  happened  that  in  its  earlier  years  the  Athenaeum 
collection  was  much  strongest  on  the  side  of  history. 
It  also  happened  that  in  1818  Mr.  Israel  Thorndike 
bought  for  Harvard  College  in  one  purchase  the 
collection  of  early  American  authorities  which  had 
been  made  by  Ebeling,  a  German  collector  in  the 
first  quarter  of  the  century.  This  collection  is  still 
unrivaled.  There  was  thus,  so  Dr.  Palfrey  said,  a 
sort  of  temptation  to  young  Bostonians  to  read  and 
study  American  history.  And  it  is  almost  fair  to 
speak  of  the  Boston  "  school  of  history  "  which  was 
thus  formed. 

I  was  a  boy  of  eleven,  reading  to  my  mother  on 
a  summer  afternoon,  when  my  father  brought  into 
the  room  a  black-haired,  olive-complexioned,  hand 
some  young  man,  and  said :  "  Here  is  Mr.  Bancroft, 
my  dear !  The  first  volume  of  the  History  is  fin 
ished,  and  he  has  come  in  to  talk  about  printing 
and  publishers."  This  was  the  beginning  of  my 
acquaintance,  I  believe  I  may  say  friendship,  with 
Mr.  Bancroft,  which  lasted  until  he  died  in  1891. l 

1  In  the  preface  Bancroft  says  that  he  has  formed  the  design  of 
writing  our  history  "  to  the  present  time."     "  The  work  will  extend 


BOSTON  IN  THE  FORTIES  69 

It  is  convenient  to  remember  that  he  was  as  old  as 
the  century.  In  1833,  the  time  of  which  I  speak, 
Prescott  was  already  at  work  on  "  Ferdinand  and 
Isabella."  Sparks  had  edited  the  "  Diplomatic  Cor 
respondence/'  and  was  collecting  the  materials  for 
his  "  Washington."  Richard  Hildreth,  who  edited 
the  Boston  "  Atlas,"  was  preparing  for  his  history 
of  the  United  States.  Palfrey  in  1839  gave  up  his 
professorship  at  Cambridge  that  he  might  devote 
himself  to  the  history  of  New  England.  Lothrop 
Motley  is  younger,  but  he  published  "  Merry- 
mount"  as  early  as  1848.  I  may  add  that  the 
patriotic  anniversary  orations  of  both  the  Everetts 
are  historical  studies.  Edward  Everett,  in  particu 
lar,  had  the  historic  sense  and  tact  very  delicately 
developed.  Mr.  Emerson  once  said  of  him  that 
"  for  a  man  who  threw  out  so  many  facts  he  was 
seldom  convicted  of  a  blunder."  To  which  remark 
I  will  add  that  Mr.  Emerson  also  is  always  accurate 
in  his  frequent  references  to  American  history. 

It  seems  best  to  attempt  this  sketch  of  the  liter 
ary  surroundings  of  the  life  on  which  the  young 
law  student  is  now  to  enter.  With  every  person 
who  has  been  named,  and,  indeed,  with  almost 
everybody  who  had  anything  to  do  with  letters  in 
Boston,  Lowell  was  personally  acquainted;  with 
many  of  them  he  was  intimately  acquainted. 

to  four,  perhaps  five,  volumes."  In  fact,  four  volumes  carried  him 
to  1776.  When  he  died  he  had  published  twelve,  which  brought  him 
to  1789.  One  volume  of  this  series,  which  advances  the  history  only 
one  year,  followed  its  predecessor  after  two  years. 


CHAPTER  VI 

THE   BROTHERS   AND    SISTERS 

THERE  was  an  inner  circle  of  companionship,  in 
which  Lowell  enjoyed  the  entire  love  of  all  the  oth 
ers,  some  record  of  which  is  necessary  if  we  would 
begin  to  understand  even  the  outside  of  his  life  at 
that  time.  I  find  it  hard  to  determine  how  far  I 
shall  put  on  paper  the  memories  of  this  circle.  I 
know  very  well  that  it  is  easy  to  say  too  little  and 
easy  to  say  too  much. 

In  college  life,  especially  in  their  senior  year,  five 
of  the  young  men  in  this  company  had  lived  at 
Cambridge  in  the  closest  intimacy.  These  were 
Lowell,  William  Wetmore  Story,  John  Gallison 
King,  William  Abijah  White,  and  my  brother  Na 
than.  There  is  no  need  of  saying  how  this  inti 
macy  grew  up.  White  and  King  were  cousins. 
Story  and  Lowell  were  both  Cambridge  boys,  and 
had  been  at  Wells's  school  together.  Lowell  and 
Hale  were  together  in  Alpha  Delta  and  in  "  Har- 
vardiana."  So  far  I  need  not  try  to  distinguish 
this  company  from  companies  of  college  seniors 
such  as  many  of  my  readers  have  known. 

But  there  was  a  distinction,  unique  so  far  as  I 
have  seen,  in  the  fact  that  four  of  these  young  men 
had  sisters  of  nearly  their  own  age,  all  charming 


THE  BROTHERS  AND   SISTERS  71 

young  women,  whose  tastes,  interests,  and  studies 
were  precisely  the  same  as  their  brothers',  and 
whose  complete  intimacy  and  tender,  personal,  self- 
sacrificing  love  for  each  other  was  absolute.  I  am 
asked  by  a  friend  whom  I  consult  with  regard  to 
this  narrative  to  say,  what  I  had  not  said  at  first 
but  what  is  true,  that  they  were  of  remarkable  per 
sonal  beauty.  No  girls  ever  lived  with  one  heart 
and  one  soul  in  more  complete  union  and  harmony 
than  these  five.  They  were  Anna  Maria  White, 
who  married  Lowell ;  Mary  Story,  who  married 
George  Ticknor  Curtis ;  Augusta  Gilman  King  and 
Caroline  Howard  King,  and  Sarah  Everett  Hale. 
In  their  personal  talk,  in  their  constant  letters,  they 
spoke  of  themselves  as  "  The  Band."  But  I  need 
not  say  that  where  there  was  such  an  intimacy  as 
theirs,  or  where  there  was  such  an  intimacy  as  their 
brothers',  the  brothers  and  the  sisters  were  equally 
intimate.  The  home  of  each  was  the  home  of  all. 
These  homes  were  in  Boston,  Watertown,  Cam 
bridge,  and  Salem.  Lowell  was  made  as  intimate 
in  each  of  these  homes  as  he  was  in  his  own  father's 
house.  Among  all  these  ten  there  was  the  simplest 
and  most  absolute  personal  friendship. 

While  the  girls  called  this  association  "  The 
Band,"  the  boys  were  more  apt  to  call  it  "  The 
Club."  Not  that  it  ever  had  any  place  of  meeting, 
any  rules,  any  duties,  or  any  other  conditions  of  any 
club  that  was  ever  heard  of;  but  that,  generally 
speaking,  where  one  of  them  was,  there  was  an 
other.  If  one  had  money,  all  had  it.  If  one  had  a 
book,  all  had  it.  If  one  went  to  Salem  to  a  dance, 


72  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

the  probability  was  that  all  five  went ;  what  was 
certain  was  that  two  or  three  went.  If,  at  the 
party,  one  of  the  young  men  was  bored  by  a  Ger 
man  savant  or  by  a  partner  he  could  not  leave,  he 
made  a  secret  signal,  and  one  of  the  others  came  to 
the  rescue.  And  so  of  their  sisters. 

I  am  able  to  speak  of  the  ladies  of  this  group 
with  the  more  freedom  because  four  of  them  died 
in  early  life.  Maria  White  married  Lowell.  Mary 
Story,  afterwards  Mary  Curtis,  died  in  May,  1848. 
Augusta  King  and  my  sister  died  unmarried. 

Whenever  they  met  at  Salem,  they  were  sure  to 
meet  also  Dr.  John  Francis  Tuckerman,  and  his  sis 
ter,  Jane  Frances  Tuckerman.  I  suppose  any  full 
catalogue  of  the  Band,  if  one  attempted  such  a 
thing,  would  include  these  two  names.  But  Tuck 
erman  was  not  a  classmate  of  Lowell's ;  he  was 
studying  medicine  while  the  others  were  studying 
law,  and  Lowell  was  not  thrown  into  such  personal 
intimacy  with  him  as  with  the  others. 

I  am  favored,  by  the  person  best  competent  to 
write,  with  a  few  reminiscences :  — 

DEAR  E :  You  have  asked  me  to  write  for 

you  what  I  can  remember  of  James  Lowell's  connec 
tion  with  the  Band  of  Brothers  and  Sisters.  I  will 
gladly  try  to  do  so,  though  it  would  be  as  impossible 
to  produce  on  paper  the  charm  of  that  brilliant 
circle  as  to  catch  a  falling  star  and  imprison  it  for 
future  examination ! 

But  perhaps  I  can  make  a  picture  for  you  of  one 
of  the  Band  meetings  at  my  father's  house,  at  which 


THE  BROTHERS  AND   SISTERS  73 

James  Lowell  was  present,  which  may  give  some 
faint  idea  of  that  gay  group  of  friends. 

It  is  in  April,  1842,  and  for  weeks  sounds  of  pre 
paration  have  been  echoing  through  the  old  house. 
Two  beds  are  placed  in  each  of  the  spacious  bed 
rooms,  the  larder  is  supplied  with  dainties,  a  feeling 
of  expectation  pervades  the  air,  and  a  sense  of  gen 
eral  festivity  is  diffused  through  the  house,  which 
has  put  on  its  holiday  dress  to  greet  the  coming 
guests.  As  they  were  all  friends  of  James  Lowell's 
at  that  time,  perhaps  a  slight  sketch  of  some  of 
them  may  interest  your  readers. 

First,  James  himself,  slight  and  small,  with  rosy 
cheeks  and  starry  eyes  and  waving  hair  parted  in 
the  middle,  very  like  Page's  picture.  He  was  very 
reserved  in  manner,  much  absorbed  in  his  lady-love, 
and  although  his  wit  was  always  brilliant,  it  had 
not  then  ripened  into  the  delightful  humor  of  after 
days.  He  and  his  friend  William  Page,  the  artist, 
were  at  this  time  possessed  with  a  divine  fury  for 
Shakespeare's  Sonnets.  The  little  book  was  for 
ever  in  their  hands,  and  happy  were  they  when  they 
could  catch  a  stray  brother  or  sister  to  listen  to 
"  just  this  one  beauty,"  which  usually  was  followed 
by  twenty  more ;  and  happy,  too,  was  the  brother 
or  sister,  for  although  James  did  not  then  read  well, 
his  voice  being  thin  and  without  resonance,  his 
youthful,  loving  enthusiasm  cast  a  spell  over  his 
crooning,  the  charm  of  which  nobody  could  resist.1 

N.  H.,  tall  and  graceful,  perhaps  the  most  highly 

i  I  have  that  little  volume  now,  enriched  with  James's  marks  and 
annotations,  and  full  of  pleasant  memories. 


74  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

gifted  of  that  bright  circle,  dropping  the  diamonds 
of  his  polished  wit  in  a  languid,  nonchalant  manner, 
but  capable  of  a  rare  awakening  when  the  right 
moment  came. 

W.  W.  S.,  versatile  and  vivacious,  a  capital 
mimic,  an  adept  at  bright  nonsense  and  gay  repar 
tee. 

W.  A.  W.  A  good  head  and  kind  heart,  always 
ready  to  cap  a  good  story  with  a  better,  which  in 
variably  began  with,  "I  knew  a  man  in  Water- 
town,"  so  that  the  man  in  Watertown  came  to  be 
counted  a  regular  member  of  the  Band. 

J.  G.  K.,  the  leader  in  the  revels,  lighting  up 
every  meeting  with  his  peculiar  racy  vein  of  humor, 
and  J.  F.  T.,  the  beauty  of  the  Band  and  the  sweet 
est  singer  of  his  time. 

And  now,  with  the  charming  group  of  sisters, 
they  have  all  arrived  at  "The  King's  Arms"  (as 
they  liked  to  call  the  cheerful  old  house)  for  a 
week's  visit,  and  I  will  try  to  bring  back  one  even 
ing  of  that  happy  time. 

We  were  all  in  a  peculiarly  gay  frame  of  mind, 
for  a  little  plan,  devised  by  the  sisters  to  surprise 
and  please  James,  had  proved  entirely  successful. 
The  "  Year's  Life "  was  just  published,  but  had 
not  been  as  warmly  received  by  the  public  as  we, 
with  our  esprit  de  corps,  thought  it  deserved  ;  so  it 
was  arranged  that  when,  on  this  evening,  James, 
as  usual,  asked  for  music,  one  of  the  number  (our 
prima  donna)  should  sing  one  of  his  own  songs, 
"From  the  closed  window  gleams  no  spark," 

1  The  Serenade. 


JAMES   RUSSELL   LOWELL 

From  the  crayon  by  William  Page  in  the  possession  of  Mrs.  Charles  F.  Briggst 
Brooklyn,  N.  V. 


THE  BROTHERS  AND  SISTERS  75 

adapted  to  a  lovely  old  air.  The  song  was  a  great 
favorite  with  both  James  and  Maria,  for  whom  it 
was  written,  and  as  the  well-known  words  rang 
through  the  room,  it  was  delightful  to  watch 
James's  face.  Surprise,  pleasure,  tremulous  feeling, 
and  finally  a  look  of  delight  as  he  turned  to  Maria, 
flashed  over  it.  He  had  been  a  member  of  the 
Band  for  only  a  short  time  (through  his  engage 
ment  to  M.  W.),  and  this  friendly  appreciation  was 
doubly  valued  by  both  of  them. 

In  those  days  we  always  had  a  fourth  meal  at 
about  ten  o'clock,  and  after  an  evening  of  music 
and  dancing,  and  a  good  time  generally,  we  ad 
journed  to  the  dining-room,  where,  seated  at  the 
large  round  table,  the  great  festivity  began,  and  an 
unfailing  flow  of  wit,  sentiment,  fun,  and  scintilla 
tion  was  kept  up  into  the  small  hours  of  the  night. 
Sometimes  James  Lowell  would  be  called  upon  for 
one  of  his  two  songs,  "  The  Battle  of  the  Nile," 
or  "  Baxter's  Boys  They  Built  a  Mill."  If  "  The 
Battle  of  the  Nile  "  were  chosen,  we  prepared  for 
fun.  The  words  were  only, 

"  The  battle  of  the  Nile, 
I  was  there  all  the  while," l 

in  endless  repetition,  sung  to  a  slow,  droning  tune. 
James  had  no  voice  and  little  ear,  though  he  loved 
music.  He  would  begin  in  a  lifeless,  indifferent 
manner,  hardly  raising  his  head,  while  we  all  sat 

1  The  oldest  form  of  this  song  is  — 

"  The  siege  of  Belle  Isle, 

I  was  there  all  the  while." 
This  carries  it  back  as  far  as  1761. 


76  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

quietly  round  him.  Presently  W.  S.  would  join 
with  his  deep  bass,  then  a  clear  soprano  or  a  tenor 
would  be  heard,  and  so  on,  one  after  another  drop 
ping  in,  until  in  the  end  the  whole  circle  would  be 
on  their  feet,  singing  at  the  top  of  their  voices, 
James  leading  them  with  all  the  airs  and  graces  of 
a  finished  conductor.  Then  James  would  call  upon 
my  father  for  his  favorite  song,  — 

"  In  a  mouldering  cave  where 
The  wretched  retreat, 
Britannia  sat  wasted  with  care. 
She  wept  for  her  Wolfe"  — 

and  at  this  point  the  whole  party  were  expected  to 
break  out  into  dolorous  weeping.  Then  came 
songs  and  glees,  in  the  choruses  of  which  we  all 
heartily  joined.  Or  M.  W.  would  repeat  "  Bin- 
norie,  oh  Binnorie,"  or  W.  S.  sing  "  A  Life  on  the 
Ocean  Wave,"  or  some  of  the  party  sing  and  act 
for  us  the  oratorio  of  the  "  Skeptic,"  with  one 
awful  chorus,  "  Tremble  Whipstick,"  in  which  we 
were  all  expected  to  show  violent  signs  of  trembling 
fear.  It  was  all  nonsense,  but  delightful  nonsense, 
the  bubbling  over  of  these  gay  young  spirits. 

But  this  is  only  a  sketch  of  the  lighter  hours  of 
the  Band.  We  had  our  serious  times,  when  every*' 
thing  in  heaven  or  on  earth  was  discussed  with  the 
airy  audacity  that  belongs  to  youth,  when  all  the 
questions  of  the  day  —  art,  politics,  poetry,  ethics, 
religion,  philosophy  —  were  bowled  down  by  our 
light  balls,  with  easy  certainty  that  we  were  quite 
able  to  settle  the  affairs  of  the  world.  There  was 
great  variety  of  character  and  opinion  among  us, 


THE  BROTHERS  AND  SISTERS  77 

so  that  our  discussions  did  not  lack  spice  and  vigor; 
but  for  the  short  time  he  was  with  us,  when  wit 
met  wit  in  the  bright  melee,  there  was  no  keener 
lance  in  rest  among  the  "Knights  of  the  Eound 
Table  "  than  James  Lowell's. 


CHAPTER  VH 

A    MAN    OF    LETTERS 

LOWELL  first  saw  Maria  White  on  the  first  of 
December,  1839.  At  the  moment,  I  suppose,  he  did 
not  know  that  it  was  preordained  that  they  two 
should  be  one.  Mr.  Norton  has  hunted  out  an  early 
letter  of  his  which  he  wrote  the  day  after  that  meet 
ing  :  "  I  went  up  to  Watertown  on  Saturday  with 
W.  A.  White,  and  spent  the  Sabbath  with  him.  .  .  . 
His  sister  is  a  very  pleasant  and  pleasing  young  lady, 
and  knows  more  poetry  than  any  one  I  am  acquainted 
with.  I  mean,  she  is  able  to  repeat  more.  She  is 
more  familiar,  however,  with  modern  poets  than  with 
the  pure  wellsprings  of  English  poesy."  The  truth 
is  that  their  union  was  made  in  heaven,  that  it  was 
a  perfect  marriage,  that  they  belonged  together  and 
lived  one  life.  She  was  exquisitely  beautiful;  her 
tastes  and  habits  were  perfectly  simple ;  her  educa 
tion,  as  I  look  back  on  what  I  know  of  it,  seems  to 
me  as  perfect  as  any  education  can  be.  Among 
other  experiences  which  did  her  no  harm,  she  was 
one  of  the  frightened  girls  who  fled  from  the  Ursu- 
line  Convent  in  Char  lest  own  before  it  was  destroyed 
by  a  mob,  in  1834.  Her  mother  was  one  of  the 
most  charming  women  who  ever  lived.  A  cluster 
of  sisters,  of  all  ages  down  to  romping  little  girls, 


v 


s 


MARIA    LOWELL 

From  tJie  crayon  by  S.  llr.  Rowse,  in  the  possession  of  Miss  Georgina  Lowell  Putnam, 

Boston 


A  MAN  OF  LETTERS  79 

young  women  of  exquisite  sensitiveness  and  character, 
and  with  such  a  training  as  such  a  mother  would  be 
sure  to  give,  made  the  great  Watertown  house  the 
most  homelike  of  homes.  In  such  a  home  Lowell 
found  his  beautiful  wife,  and  they  loved  each  other 
from  the  beginning. 

I  remember,  while  I  am  writing  these  lines,  that 
all  the  five  young  men  spoken  of  in  the  last  chapter 
entered  their  names,  on  graduating,  on  the  books  of 
the  Law  School.  They  spent  more  or  less  of  the 
next  eighteen  months  at  Cambridge.  Their  inti 
macy,  however,  did  not  spring  from  this.  It  might 
be  said,  indeed,  that  they  all  went  to  the  Law  School 
because  they  were  intimate,  rather  than  that  they 
were  intimate  because  they  went  to  the  Law  School. 
Of  the  five,  King  only  was  a  professional  lawyer 
through  his  life.  His  honored  father  before  him, 
John  Glen  King,  of  the  Harvard  class  of  1807,  a 
learned  and  scholarly  man,  had  been  a  distinguished 
leader  at  the  Essex  bar.  Story  gave  most  of  his  life 
to  letters  and  to  art,  but  his  earliest  publication  is  a 
series  of  Law  Reports,  and  he  afterwards  published 
—  in  1844  —  a  book  on  Contracts.  My  brother, 
after  he  opened  his  law  office,  was  early  turned  away 
from  his  profession  to  the  management  of  the  "Daily 
Advertiser;"  and  White,  who  died  at  the  age  of 
thirty-six,  before  any  of  the  rest  of  them,  gave  so 
much  of  his  time  to  the  temperance  and  anti-slavery 
reforms,  and  to  political  work,  that  he  cannot  be 
spoken  of  as  a  practicing  lawyer.  None  of  them 
are  now  living. 

With  another  classmate  Lowell  was  on  the  most 


80  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

intimate  terms  —  Dr.  George  Bailey  Loring,  since 
distinguished  as  the  head  of  the  Department  of 
Agriculture  in  Washington.  Loring  studied  medi 
cine  at  the  same  time  when  Lowell  went  to  the  Law 
School ;  but  Lowell  frequently  visited  Loring's  beau 
tiful  home  in  Andover,  and  from  schooldays  forward 
the  similarity  of  their  tastes  brought  them  into  almost 
constant  correspondence  in  matters  of  literature.  Dr. 
Loring  was  the  son  of  the  minister  of  Andover,  and 
that  gentleman  and  Lowell's  father  had  been  friends. 
For  us  now,  this  has  proved  singularly  fortunate ; 
for  Loring  carefully  preserved  all  his  letters  from 
Lowell,  and  Mr.  Norton  has  selected  from  them  many 
for  publication,  which  throw  valuable  light  upon 
these  early  days,  in  which  Lowell  really  revealed 
everything  to  this  friend.  He  was  always  frank  to 
the  utmost  with  his  correspondents,  and  relied  upon 
their  discretion.  He  was  never  more  annoyed  than 
when  a  correspondent  or  an  interviewer  presumed 
upon  this  frankness  in  repeating,  or  half  repeating, 
anything,  where  Lowell  had  relied  on  the  discretion 
of  a  gentleman.  Dr.  Loring  sympathized  entirely 
with  Lowell's  growing  determination  to  devote  him 
self  to  literary  work,  and  this  sympathy  naturally 
encouraged  him,  as  he  broke  off,  sooner  than  he 
perhaps  expected,  from  the  practice  of  law. 

Lowell  once  wrote  a  funny  story  which  he  called 
"My  First  Client."  I  guess  that  at  the  bottom  it 
was  true.  I  think  that  when  the  painter  who  had 
painted  his  sign  came  in  with  his  bill,  Lowell  thought 
for  a  moment  that  he  had  a  client.  Out  of  this  he 
spun  an  amusing  "  short  story." 


A  MAN  OF  LETTERS  81 

This  little  sketch  of  his  has,  in  itself,  given  the 
impression,  perhaps,  that  he  cared  nothing  about  the 
law,  and  that  his  LL.  B.  on  the  college  catalogue  and 
his  admission  to  the  Suffolk  bar  were  purely  per 
functory.  It  is  true  that  he  never  practiced,  and 
that  before  long  he  stopped  paying  office  rent,  and 
that  his  sign  was  taken  down.  But  it  is  not  true 
that  he  threw  away  the  three  years  when  he  pre 
tended  to  be  studying  for  his  profession.  In  those' 
days  the  Massachusetts  custom  was  that  a  young 
lawyer  who  sought  the  best  studied  for  a  year  and  a 
half  at  Cambridge  under  Story  and  Greenleaf,  then 
spent  as  much  time  in  a  lawyer's  office,  and  then 
entered  at  the  bar  after  a  formal  examination.  In 
this  way  Lowell  spent  three  or  four  terms  at  Cam 
bridge,  and  then  he  spent  as  much  time  in  regular 
attendance  in  the  office  of  his  father's  friend  and 
parishioner,  the  Hon.  Charles  Greeley  Loring,  for 
many  years  a  leader  at  the  Boston  bar/  It  is  not 
difficult  to  trace  the  results  of  Lowell's  faithful  work 
in  these  three  years  in  his  after  writing.  Any 
person  makes  a  great  mistake  who  infers  from  the 
abandon  of  some  of  his  literary  fun  that  he  did  not 
know  how  to  work,  steadily  and  faithfully,  better 
than  the  worst  Philistine  who  was  ever  born. 

But  the  stars  in  their  courses  did  not  propose  that 
he  should  be  a  chief  justice,  or  a  celebrated  writer 
on  torts,  or  that  he  should  make  brilliant  pleas  be 
fore  a  jury.  They  had  other  benefits  in  store  for 
the  world. 

It  is  pathetic  now  to  see  how  little  welcome  there 
was  then  for  a  young  poet,  or  how  little  temptation 


82  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

for  a  literary  career.  It  was  thought  a  marvel  that 
the  first  "  New  England  Magazine  "  and  the  "  North 
American  Review"  should  pay  a  dollar  a  page  to 
their  writers.  In  Longfellow's  Life,  as  in  Mr.  Low 
ell's  early  letters,  you  find  notes  of  the  "  Knicker 
bocker/'  "Godey,"  and  "Graham,"  at  Philadelphia, 
and  the  "  Southern  Literary,"  as  willing  to  print 
what  was  good,  but  there  is  evidence  enough  that 
the  writers  wrote  for  fame  in  the  intervals  spared 
them  from  earning  their  bread  and  butter.  Holmes 
speaks  as  if  he  should  have  lost  caste  in  his  profes 
sion  in  those  early  days  had  he  been  known  as  a 
literary  man.  He  even  implies  that  Lowell  himself 
dragged  him  back  to  his  literary  career. 

But  better  times  for  American  letters  or  for  the 
independent  profession  of  literary  men  were  at  hand. 
"Graham's  Magazine"  and  "Godey's  Lady's  Book" 
had  achieved  what  was  called  a  large  circulation. 
Stimulated  by  their  success,  two  young  publishers  in 
Boston,  named  Bradbury  and  Soden,  determined  to 
try  a  magazine  in  New  England  which  should  appeal 
for  its  support  to  the  supposed  literary  class  of  the 
country,  as  Blackwood  did,  and,  in  America,  the 
"  Portfolio,"  the  "  Knickerbocker,"  and  the  "  Liter 
ary  Messenger."  But  it  was  also  to  print  fashion- 
plates,  and  so  appeal  to  the  women  of  the  country, 
even  if  they  did  not  care  for  literature.  So  it  was 
to  be  called  "  The  Boston  Miscellany  of  Literature 
and  Fashion."  There  were  to  be  forty-six  pages  of 
literature,  with  a  good  steel  engraving,  in  every 
number,  and  two  pages  of  fashion,  with  a  fashion- 
plate. 


A  MAN  OF  LETTERS  83 

My  brother  was  to  be  responsible  for  the  literature, 
and  somebody,  I  think  in  New  York,  for  the  fashion, 
with  which  the  former  had  nothing  to  do.  I  re 
member  he  had  to  explain  this  to  Mrs.  Stowe,  whom 
he  had  asked  to  contribute.  She  had  declined  be 
cause  she  had  been  shocked  by  a  decolletee  figure  on 
one  of  these  plates.  Dear  Mrs.  Stowe,  in  her  Eng 
lish  progress  ten  years  afterwards,  had  an  opportunity 
to  reconcile  herself  with  dresses  much  more  pro 
nounced. 

The  "  Atlantic "  to-day  calls  itself  a  journal  o£ 
literature,  art,  science,  and  politics.  It  does  not 
undertake  to  reconcile  fashion  with  literature.  If 
Messrs.  Bradbury  and  Soden  had  been  questioned, 
they  would  have  said,  what  was  true,  that  there  was 
no  class  of  readers  who  could  sustain  creditably  a 
purely  literary  magazine.  The  rate  at  which  the 
poor  "Knickerbocker"  was  expiring  was  evidence 
of  this.  But  they  would  have  said  that  there  were 
a  great  many  factory-girls  in  the  country  for  whom 
there  was  no  journal  of  fashion.  They  would  have 
said  that  these  girls  could  be  relied  upon  to  float  the 
literary  magazine,  if  in  each  number  there  was  a 
love-story  which  they  would  be  glad  to  read.  And 
I  remember  that  there  was  great  glee  in  the  count 
ing-room  when  it  was  announced  that  a  thousand 
copies  of  the  new  magazine  had  been  sold  in 
Lowell. 

My  brother  was  very  stiff  about  concessions  to 
the  fashionable  side.  Two  pages  might  be  fash 
ion,  and  as  bad  fashion  as  the  publishers  wanted, 
but  his  forty-six  pages  were  to  be  the  best  which  he 


84  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

could  command.  After  a  few  numbers  had  been 
issued,  he  made  a  negotiation  with  Duyckinck,  the 
editor  of  the  "  Arcturus,"  by  which  the  short-lived 
magazine  was  transferred  to  him.  This  gave  him 
the  help  of  some  of  the  bright  New  Yorkers.  They 
sent  to  him  their  accumulated  manuscripts,  and  I 
then  saw  the  handwriting  of  Elizabeth  Barrett  — 
Mrs.  Browning  —  for  the  first  time.  Soon  after  this 
these  young  men  in  Boston  made  the  personal  ac 
quaintance  of  their  New  York  correspondents,  and 
from  that  time  began  Lowell's  close  friendship  with 
Mr.  Charles  F.  Briggs. 

Of  other  writers  rising  to  fame,  who  were  secured 
for  the  "  Miscellany,"  was  Hawthorne,  who,  to  the 
great  pleasure  of  all  of  us,  contributed  the  article 
"  A  Virtuoso's  Collection."  Lowell  probably  met 
him  for  the  first  time  at  Elizabeth  Peabody's.  Haw 
thorne  soon  after  married  her  charming  sister.  As 
a  nom  de  plume  for  a  great  deal  of  his  work,  Haw 
thorne  assumed  the  French  translation  of  his  name. 
His  stories  in  the  "Democratic  Review  "  of  this  time 
were  attributed  to  "  Monsieur  d'Aubepine."  Lowell 
says  of  him  in  his  Concord  address  :  "  You  would 
think  me  extravagant,  I  fear,  if  I  said  how  highly  I 
rate  the  genius  of  Hawthorne  in  the  history  of  liter 
ature.  At  any  rate,  Hawthorne  taught  us  one  great 
and  needful  lesson  ;  and  that  is,  that  our  own  past 
was  an  ample  storehouse  for  the  brightest  works  of 
imagination  or  fancy." 

It  is  interesting  now  to  see  that  Walt  Whitman, 
who  then  called  himself  Walter,  had  begun  as  early 
as  this  his  literary  career. 


CHARLES   F.    BRIGGS 


A  MAN  OF  LETTERS  85 

The  page  of  the  "  Miscellany  "  was  an  imitation 
as  precise  as  possible  of  the  page  which  Edward 
Moxon  in  London  had  adopted  for  several  of  his 
popular  series.  All  these  young  men  had  read  and 
enjoyed  the  first  part  of  Browning's  "  Bells  and 
Pomegranates,"  which  had  appeared  with  Moxon's 
imprint  in  this  form  in  1842. 

I  speak  at  this  length  of  the  "  Miscellany,"  of 
which  we  print  a  facsimile  of  one  page,  because  in 
that  year  Lowell  really  made  his  determination  to 
lead  a  literary  life.  It  was  not  the  life  of  a  poet 
simply,  but  a  life  of  letters,  to  which  from  this 
time  he  looked  forward.  To  the  volume  of  the 
"Miscellany"  published  in  1842  he  contributed 
the  following :  three  articles  on  "  Old  English 
Dramatists,"  the  two  sketches  "  My  First  Client " 
and  "  Getting  Up,"  and,  in  verse,  the  sonnet  to 
Keats,  "  The  Two,"  "  To  Perdita  Singing,"  "  Fan 
tasy,"  "  The  Shepherd  of  King  Admetus,"  and  two 
unnamed  sonnets. 

In  the  second  number  of  the  "  Miscellany,"  under 
the  date  of  December,  1841,  appeared  also  the 
"  Ode "  which  he  afterwards  thought  worth  re 
printing  in  the  collected  edition  of  his  works.  One 
cannot  but  see  in  it  a  careful  statement  of  his  own 
hopes  and  resolves  for  his  future.  It  was  originally 
printed  in  stanzas  of  four  lines  ;  as  he  recast  it  sub 
sequently,  the  breaks  between  the  stanzas  disappear. 
The  following  characteristic  verses  show  what  was 
central  in  his  thought  and  feeling  at  this  time  :  — 

"  This,  this  is  he  for  whom  the  world  is  waiting 
To  sing  the  beatings  of  its  mighty  heart. 


86  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

Too  long  hath  it  been  patient  with  the  grating 
Of  scrannel-pipes,  and  heard  it  misnamed  Art. 

"  To  him  the  smiling  soul  of  man  shall  listen, 

Laying  awhile  its  crown  of  thorns  aside, 
And  once  again  in  every  eye  shall  glisten 
The  glory  of  a  nature  satisfied. 

"  His  verse  shall  have  a  great  commanding  motion, 

Heaving  and  swelling  with  a  melody 
Learnt  of  the  sky,  the  river,  and  the  ocean, 
And  all  the  pure,  majestic  things  that  be. 

"  Awake,  then,  thou  !  we  pine  for  thy  great  presence 

To  make  us  feel  the  soul  once  more  sublime. 
We  are  of  far  too  infinite  an  Essence 
To  rest  contented  with  the  lies  of  Time. 

"  Speak  out !  and  lo,  a  hush  of  deepest  wonder 

Shall  sink  o'er  all  this  many  voiced  scene, 
As  when  a  sudden  burst  of  rattling  thunder 
Shatters  the  blueness  of  a  sky  serene." 

J 

In  a  private  note  on  the  8th  of  July  he  says  of 
this  Ode  :  "  I  esteem  it  the  best  I  ever  wrote."  And 
he  adds,  "  I  find  that  my  pen  follows  my  soul  more 
easily  the  older  I  grow.  I  know  that  I  have  a  mis 
sion  to  accomplish,  and  if  I  live  I  will  do  the  work 
my  Father  giveth  me  to  do." 

» At  the  end  of  the  year,  when  my  brother  resigned 
the  management  of  the  "  Miscellany,"  Lowell  and 
his  friend  Robert  Carter  ventured  on  the  "  Pioneer," 
which  was  to  be  a  magazine  of  "  literature  and  art." 
Fashion  was  thrown  out  of  the  window ;  and  for 
illustrations,  they  began  with  some  good  pictures 
from  Flaxman. 

Lowell  was  already  engaged  to  be  married  to 
Miss  White.  Their  lives  were  wholly  bound  up  in 


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A  MAN  OF  LETTERS  87 

each  other.  He  was  writing  to  her  charming  letters 
in  poetry  and  in  prose,  and  she  to  him  in  letters  as 
charming.  They  read  together,  they  dreamed  to 
gether,  they  forecast  the  future  together.  In  such 
a  daily  atmosphere  it  was  natural  that  he  should 
choose  that  future  rightly. 

"  Perhaps  then  first  he  understood 
Himself  how  wondrously  endued." 

He  knew  what  was  in  him.  By  this  time  he  knew  he 
could  work  steadily,  and  when  he  wrote  in  triumph, 

"  I  am  a  maker  and  a  poet, 
I  feel  it  and  I  know  it," 

he  wrote  in  that  frank  confidence  in  his  future 
which  his  future  wholly  justified. 

In  the  fifth  volume  of  the  present  series  of  the 
"  New  England  Magazine  "  Mr.  Mead  has  given  us  a 
charming  article  on  the  three  numbers  of  the  "  Pio 
neer."  These  numbers  are  now  among  the  rarities 
most  prized  by  American  book  collectors.  And 
there  is  hardly  a  page  of  the  "  Pioneer  "  which  one 
does  not  read  with  a  certain  interest,  in  view  of 
what  has  followed.  At  the  end  of  three  numbers 
the  journal  died,  because  it  had  not  subscribers 
enough  to  pay  for  it.  It  may  be  observed  in  this 
history  of  our  early  magazines  that  all  these  pub 
lishers  lived  on  what  we  may  call  placer  gold-wash 
ings,  for  nobody  here  had  yet  discovered  the  quartz 
rock  of  an  advertising  patronage.  In  the  "  Miscel 
lany  "  and  the  "  Pioneer  "  no  enterprising  advertiser 
assisted  in  the  payment  of  the  bills.  There  was  not 
one  advertisement  in  either.  The  English  maga 
zines  printed  advertisements  long  before. 


88  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

In  Lowell's  Introductory,  written,  as  will  be  ob 
served,  when  he  was  not  yet  twenty-four  years  old, 
he  gives  what  Mr.  Mead  well  calls  a  characteristic 
expression  of  those  views  of  American  literature 
which  always  controlled  him  afterward :  "  Every 
thing  that  tends  to  encourage  the  sentiment  of  caste 
should  be  steadily  resisted  by  all  good  men.  But 
we  do  long  for  a  natural  literature.  One  green 
leaf,  though  of  the  veriest  weed,  is  worth  all  the 
crape  and  wire  flowers  of  the  daintiest  Paris  milli 
ners."  The  whole  article  is  well  worth  study  by 
the  young  critics  now. 

<  It  is  rather  funny  to  see,  in  these  days,  that 
Nathaniel  Parker  Willis,  who  then  considered  him 
self  as  the  leader  of  the  young  literature  of  America, 
gave  this  opinion  of  Lowell  in  reviewing  the  first 
number  of  the  "  Pioneer :  "  — 
v  "J.  E.  Lowell,  a  man  of  original  and  decided 
genius,  has  started  a  monthly  magazine  in  Boston. 
The  first  number  liesMbefore  us,  and  it  justifies  our 
expectation,  —  namely,  that  a  man  of  genius,  who  is 
merely  a  man  of  genius,  is  a  very  unfit  editor  for  a 
periodical." 

This  remark  of  Willis  is  interesting  now,  since 
Lowell  has  proved  himself  perhaps  the  best  literary 
editor  whom  the  history  of  American  journalism 
has  yet  discovered.  It  is  just  possible,  as  the 
reader  will  see,  that  Willis  did  not  write  this  him 
self. 

Lowell's  connection  with  the  "  Pioneer  "  occupied 
him  for  the  closing  months  of  1842  and  the  begin 
ning  of  1843.  This  was  at  a  period  when  his  eyes 


A  MAN  OF  LETTERS  89 

troubled  him  badly.  Writing  from  New  York,  he 
says :  "  Every  morning  I  go  to  Dr.  Elliott's  (who, 
by  the  way,  is  very  kind)  and  wait  for  my  turn  to 
be  operated  upon.  This  sometimes  consumes  a 
great  deal  of  time,  the  Doctor  being  overrun  with 
patients.  After  being  made  stone  blind  for  the 
space  of  fifteen  minutes,  I  have  the  rest  of  the  day 
to  myself." 

On  the  17th  of  January  he  writes,  "  My  eyes, 
having  been  operated  on  yesterday  with  the  knife, 
must  be  used  charily ; "  and  again  on  the  22d  he 
writes  that  he  had  had  a  second  operation  performed 
on  the  20th. 

" Handbills  of  the  ' Pioneer'  in  red  and  black, 
with  a  spread  eagle  at  the  head  of  them,  face 
me  everywhere.  I  could  not  but  laugh  to  see  a 
drayman  standing  with  his  hands  in  his  pockets 
diligently  spelling  it  out,  being  attracted  thereto 
doubtless  by  the  bird  of  America,  which  probably 
led  him  to  think  it  the  Proclamation  of  the  Pre 
sident,  a  delusion  from  which  he  probably  did  not 
awake  after  perusing  the  document." 

And  on  the  24th  he  says :  "  I  can  scarcely  get 
through  with  one  letter  without  pain,  and  every 
thing  that  I  write  retards  my  cure,  and  so  keeps  me 
the  longer  here.  But  I  love  Keats  so  much  that  I 
think  I  can  write  something  good  about  him.  .  .  . 
If  you  knew  how  I  am  placed,  you  would  not 
write  me  so.  I  am  forbidden  to  write  under  pain 
of  staying  here  forever  or  losing  my  eyes.9'  And 
in  the  same  letter,  "  I  must  not  write  any  more." 

"  Have  you  got  any  copy  for  the  third  number  ? 


90  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

Do  not  ask  any  conservatives  to  write,  for  it  will 
mar  the  unity  of  the  magazine.  We  shall  be  surer 
of  success  if  we  maintain  a  uniform  course  and 
have  a  decided  tendency  either  one  way  or  the 
other.  We  shall  at  least  gain  more  influence  in  that 
way." 

v  In  New  York  he  often  met  Willis  personally,  and 
the  more  he  saw  of  him  the  better  he  liked  him. 
I  think  this  was  what  happened  with  most  people 
who  met  Willis.  It  certainly  was  so  with  me.  In 
personal  intimacy  the  studied  affectation  of  his 
printed  work  disappeared.  It  was  studied,  as  al 
most  any  one  could  guess  without  seeing  him. 
Willis  also  was  at  this  time  under  Dr.  Elliott's  care 
for  treatment  of  his  eyes.  He  told  Dr.  Elliott  that 
Lowell  had  written  the  most  remarkable  poetry 
that  had  been  written  in  this  country,  and  that  he 
was  destined  to  be  the  brightest  star  that  had  yet 
risen  in  American  literature.  He  told  Lowell  him 
self  that  he  was  more  popular  and  more  talked 
about  than  any  other  poet  in  the  land,  and  pro 
mised  him  that  he  would  help  the  "  Pioneer "  in 
every  way.  At  this  time  Willis  was  as  highly 
regarded  by  young  people,  especially  by  the  sort 
of  people  who  read  magazines,  as  any  literary  man 
in  America. 

Elizabeth  Barrett,  not  yet  married,  had  written 
for  the  Boston  "  Miscellany,"  and  on  the  20th  of 
January  Lowell  acknowledges  four  poems  from  her.1 

1  Seeing  that  Miss  Barrett  herself  recognized  the  fact  that  these 
American  magazine  publishers  were  among  the  first  people  who  ever 
paid  her  any  money,  it  is  sufficiently  English  that  in  the  same  vol- 


A  MAN  OF  LETTERS  91 

There  were  but  three  numbers  of  the  "Pioneer" 
published.  It  has  been  the  fashion  to  speak  of  it 
in  a  pitying  tone,  as  if  it  were  a  mere  foolish  enter 
prise  of  two  callow  boys.  But  if  between  the  num 
bers  or  between  the  articles  one  reads,  as  I  have 
done,  the  correspondence  between  Lowell  and  his 
"  true  friend  and  brother,"  Robert  Carter,  one  feels 
that  the  "  Pioneer  "  failed  of  success  only  from  a 
series  of  misfortunes.  Looking  back  upon  it  now, 
it  is  easy  to  say  that  it  needed  capital  for  a  begin 
ning.  Most  things  do  in  our  modern  world.  It 
is  clear  enough  in  this  case  that  the  strongest 
reason  for  undertaking  it  was  that  Lowell  lived 
and  was  at  the  beginning  of  his  successful  career. 
Without  him  there  would  have  been  no  "  Pioneer." 
Knowing  this,  when  you  find  that  through  January 
and  February  he  was  prohibited  from  writing,  that 
week  after  week  he  was  submitting  to  operations  on 
his  eyes,  and  that  he  was  in  actual  danger  of  perma 
nent  blindness,  you  cease  to  ask  why  the  "  Pioneer  " 
died  at  the  end  of  its  third  number,  and  you  won 
der,  on  the  other  hand,  that  it  lived  at  all. 

When  one  remembers  the  currency  which  Lowell's 
volumes  of  essays  have  had  from  the  very  begin 
ning,  he  reads  with  special  interest  more  than 
amusement  the  following  note  from  Miss  White, 
who  had  seen  the  publisher,  which  is  pathetic.  It 
describes  the  persuasion  necessary  to  induce  any- 

urae  of  her  correspondence  which  contains  her  acknowledgment 
there  is  talk  about  "American  piracy."  One  would  like  to  know 
whether  Mrs.  Browning  did  not  receive  in  the  long  run  more  money 
from  American  than  from  English  publishers. 


92  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

body  to  attempt  the  bold  venture  of  issuing  the 
first  in  that  remarkable  series :  — 

"  I  went  to  see  Mr.  Owen  this  afternoon,  to  talk 
to  him  about  publishing  James's  prose  volume.  He 
expressed  himself  greatly  pleased  with  the  articles, 
but  said  he  wished  to  wait  until  James's  prose  was 
better  known  to  the  public  before  he  ventured  upon 
it.  Then  I  told  him  of  the  flattering  notices  of  his 
( Old  Dramatists '  that  appeared  at  the  time  they  came 
out,  and  of  the  lavish  praise  his  prose  style  received. 
He  said  that  changed  the  face  of  affairs  wholly ; 
that  if  he  rrore  as  sure  of  the  public  as  himself  he 
should  not  hesitate.  He  said  he  wished  to  see  you 
and  talk  about  it  with  you  also." 

Let  all  young  writers  remember  this,  that  the 
public  knows  what  it  wants,  whether  publishers  are 
doubtful  or  no.  I  may  add  the  remark,  which  I 
believe  to  be  wholly  true,  of  one  of  the  most  suc 
cessful  publishers  of  our  day,  "  No  one  on  earth 
knows,  when  a  book  is  published,  whether  it  will 
sell  five  thousand  copies  or  not.  But  if  five  thou 
sand  copies  are  sold,  nothing  is  more  certain  than 
that  twenty-five  thousand  can  be." 
\  Mr.  Lowell  and  Miss  White  were  married  in  the 
end  of  December,  1844,  with  the  good  wishes,  I 
might  say,  of  everybody.  Among  her  other  ex 
quisite  faculties  she  had  a  sense  of  humor  as  keen 
as  his,  and  both  of  them  would  run  on,  in  the  fun 
niest  way,  about  their  plans  for  economical  house 
keeping.  Sheet-iron  air-tight  stoves  had  just  come 
into  being.  I  believe  I  never  see  one  to  this  day 
without  recollecting  in  what  an  amusing  vein  of 


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A  MAN  OF  LETTERS  93 

absurd  exaggeration  she  once  showed,  in  her  lively 
talk,  how  much  they  were  going  to  save  in  the  de 
tail  of  domestic  life  by  the  use  of  that  most  unro- 
mantic  bit  of  household  machinery. 

"  A  Year's  Life/'  his  maiden  volume  of  poems, 
had  been  published  in  1841,  about  the  time  of  their 
engagement.  We  used  to  pretend  that  weeks  in 
advance  of  the  publication  multitudes  of  young  girls 
who  took  a  tender  interest  in  this  most  romantic  of 
marriages  walked  daily  from  one  to  another  of  the 
half-dozen  book-shops  in  little  Boston  to  inquire  if 
"  A  Year's  Life  "  were  ready,  and  thus  to  stimulate 
the  interest  and  curiosity  of  booksellers  and  their 
clerks.  I  think  that  the  larger  publishers  of  to-day 
even  would  say  that  the  sale  was  more  than  is  to 
be  expected  from  any  new  volume  of  short  poems. 
This  was,  of  course,  only  a  retail  sale  in  Boston 
and  the  neighboring  towns.  There  was  as  yet  no 
demand  for  "  Lowell's  Poems  "  in  New  York,  Phila 
delphia,  or  London. 

Seeing  the  future  of  the  author's  poetical  reputa 
tion,  I  think  that  young  authors  may  be  interested 
in  reading  the  letter  in  which  he  first  proposes 
modestly  to  print  this  book  :  — 

"I  think,  nay  I  am  sure,  that  I  have  written 
some  worthy  things,  and  though  I  feel  well  enough 
pleased  with  myself,  yet  it  is  a  great  joy  to  us  all  to 
be  known  and  understood  by  others.  I  do  long  for 
somebody  to  like  what  I  have  written,  and  me  for 
what  I  have  written,  who  does  not  know  me.  You 
and  I  were  cured  of  the  mere  cacoethes  imprimendi 
(Ruf  us)  by  our  connection  with  '  Harvardiana : '  I 


94  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

think  that  so  far  we  should  be  thankful  to  it,  as  it 
taught  us  that  print  was  no  proof  of  worthiness,  and 
that  we  need  not  look  for  a  movement  of  the  world 
when  our  pieces  were  made  known  in  print. 

"  Now,  if  you  will  find  out  how  much  it  would 
cost  to  print  400  copies  (if  you  think  I  could  sell  so 
many ;  if  not,  300)  in  decent  style  (150  pages  — 
less  if  printed  closely),  like  Jones  Very's  book,  for 
instance,  I  could  find  out  if  I  could  get  an  indorser. 
I  should  not  charge  less  than  $1  per  vol.  —  should 
you  ?  I  don't  care  so  much  for  the  style  of  print 
ing  as  to  get  it  printed  in  any  way. 

"  Jones  Very's  style  would  be  good,  too,  because 
it  might  be  printed  by  our  old  printers,  and  that 
would  be  convenient  about  the  proofs." 

In  the  subsequent  collections  of  his  poems  he 
omitted  many  of  those  which  are  in  this  pioneer 
volume.  And  for  this  reason,  among  others,  the 
volume  is  in  great  demand  among  collectors.  But 
it  is  easy  to  see  that  he  had  even  then  —  two  years 
only  after  the  class  poem  —  outgrown  the  crudities 
of  younger  days  which  we  find  in  turning  over 
"  Harvardiana."  There  is  serious  purpose  now, 
though  it  be  expressed  only  in  two  or  three  words 
together.  Some  of  these  are  the  poems  of  a  lover. 
Yes !  but  they  are  also  the  poems  of  a  serious  young 
man  who  knows  that  there  is  duty  next  his  hand, 
and  who  is  determined,  with  God's  help  and  with 
the  help  of  her  he  loves  best,  to  carry  that  duty 
through. 

The  spirit  of  the  book  reflects  thus  the  same 
sense  of  a  mission  to  mankind  which  appears  in 


A  MAN  OF  LETTERS  95 

the  letters  which  have  been  preserved  from  a  full 
correspondence  which  he  maintained  with  Heath, 
a  young  Virginian.  Frank  Heath,  as  his  friends 
called  him,  graduated  at  Cambridge  while  Lowell 
was  in  the  Law  School,  and  a  close  intimacy  had 
grown  up  between  them.  When  Heath  left  college 
in  August,  1840,  he  returned  to  Virginia.  There 
is  a  careful  letter  from  Lowell  to  him  which  has  a 
curious  interest  now,  in  the  light  of  the  history 
which  followed.  Lowell  begs  him  to  lead  the  way 
and  to  make  himself  the  typical  man  in  the  new 
history  of  Virginia  by  emancipating  his  own  slaves 
and  leading  in  the  establishment  of  a  new  civiliza 
tion  there.  In  fact,  Heath  soon  went  to  Europe, 
and  was  lost  to  his  friends  here  for  nearly  twenty 
years  in  one  or  another  German  university.  He 
returned  to  his  own  country  in  time  to  take  a  promi 
nent  post  in  the  Confederate  army,  and  I  think  he 
lost  an  arm  in  one  of  the  battles  of  the  rebellion. 

The  publication  of  "  A  Year's  Life  "  showed  that 
Lowell  was  a  poet.  This  was  now  beyond  discus 
sion.  The  papers  in  the  "Miscellany"  and  the 
"Pioneer"  now  showed,  what  people  in  the  little 
literary  circles  of  America  knew,  that  he  wrote 
prose  well  and  that  he  had  more  than  an  amateur's 
knowledge  of  the  older  English  literature.  He 
could  work  steadily  and  faithfully. 
^  In  the  autumn  of  1843  and  the  winter  of  1843- 
44,  however,  as  has  been  said,  he  had  trouble  with 
his  eyes,  and  he  lived  for  some  time  in  New  York 
for  their  better  treatment.  Mrs.  Lowell  also,  al 
ways  of  delicate  health,  required  a  more  genial 


96  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

climate  than  Elmwood  or  Watertown  would  give 
her.  Her  lungs  were  delicate,  and  after  their  mar 
riage,  to  escape  the  harsh  climate  of  Boston,  they 
spent  the  winter  of  18M-45  in  Philadelphia.  It 
need  not  be  said  that  in  each  city  they  made  very 
near  personal  friends  who  felt  and  treasured  the 
personal  attraction  of  each  of  them,  —  an  attraction 
which  it  is  impossible  to  describe. 

In  the  same  winter  the  Southern  party  in  Con 
gress  and  the  speculators  who  had  bought  Texan 
bonds  for  next  to  nothing  were  engaged  in  driving 
through  the  last  Congress  of  President  Tyler's  ad 
ministration  the  "  joint  resolutions  "  by  which  Texas 
was  annexed  to  the  United  States.  There  were  no 
precedents  for  such  annexation.  What  would  seem 
the  natural  course  in  an  agreement  between  two  re 
publics  would  have  been  a  formal  treaty  between 
them.  But  it  was  known  that  no  treaty  for  such  a 
purpose  could  pass  the  United  States  Senate.  It 
was  determined,  therefore,  by  the  friends  of  annexa 
tion,  who  had  such  support  as  Mr.  Tyler  and  his 
Cabinet  could  give,  that  they  would  drive  these 
"  joint  resolutions  "  through  Congress.  And  this 
was  done.  The  resolutions  passed  the  Senate  by  a 
majority  of  one  only.  They  passed  the  day  before 
Mr.  Tyler  went  out  of  office.  Here  was  the  first 
pitched  battle  in  Congress  on  a  definite  national 
issue  between  the  North  and  South  since  that  defeat 
of  the  North  in  the  Missouri  Compromise  which  had 
so  excited  Charles  Lowell  the  year  after  his  son  was 
born.  The  whole  country,  North  and  South,  was 
wild  with  excitement,  as  well  it  might  be. 


JAMES    RUSSELL   LOWELL 
From  a  daguerreotype  taken  at  Philadelphia  in  1844 


A  MAN  OF  LETTERS  97 

Lowell  was  ready  to  give  himself  to  the  side  of 
freedom  with  his  pen  or  with  his  voice.  At  this 
time  he  engaged  in  the  service  first  of  the  "  Liberty 
Bell,"  an  anti-slavery  annual  published  in  Boston, 
and  afterwards  of  the  "  National  Anti-Slavery  Stand 
ard."  Mrs.  Lowell  also  wrote  for  both  journals. 

The  "  Standard  "  was  a  weekly  journal  of  great 
originality  and  ability,  published  in  New  York  un 
der  the  auspices  of  one  of  the  national  anti-slavery 
societies.  The  editor  was  Sydney  Howard  Gay, 
afterwards  so  distinguished  as  a  historian,  and  hold 
ing  all  his  life  the  most  important  trusts  as  a  jour 
nalist  in  New  York.  He  worked  with  Bryant  in  the 
"  Evening  Post."  He  worked  with  Greeley  in  the 
"  Tribune."  It  is  not  too  late  to  hope  that  his  me 
moirs  will  be  collected  and  published.  They  will 
throw  a  flood  of  light  on  points  not  yet  fully  re 
vealed  in  the  history  of  the  twenty  years  which  led 
up  to  the  fall  of  Richmond  and  the  emancipation  of 
America. 

Most  organs,  so  called,  of  a  special  philanthropy 
arc  narrow  and  bigoted,  and  so,  by  the  divine  law 
which  rules  narrowness  and  bigotry,  are  preemi 
nently  dull.  Witness  most  missionary  journals  and 
all  temperance  journals,  so  far  as  this  writer  has  ob 
served.  We  owed  it  to  Gay,  I  suppose,  that  the 
"  Anti-Slavery  Standard,"  while  pitiless  in  its  de 
nunciation  of  slavery,  was  neither  narrow,  bigoted, 
nor  dull.  Lydia  Maria  Child's  letters  from  New 
York,  which  were  published  in  it  once  a  week,  are 
still  remembered  among  editors.  They  give  an 
ideal  type  for  writing  in  that  line,  in  a  series  of 


. 


98  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

papers  which  may  well  be  studied  by  young  jour 
nalists,  for,  though  often  imitated,  they  have  never 
been  equaled.  They  are  the  despair  of  "  leading 
editors  "  who  try  to  get  such  work  done  for  them 
and  never  succeed. 

\  Lowell  engaged  himself  to  write  regularly  for  the 
"  Standard/'  and  did  so  for  some  years.  His  prose 
papers  in  that  journal  have  never  been  collected, 
but  they  would  be  well  worth  collection.  And  the 
poems  he  wrote  at  this  time,  sometimes  political,  but 
not  always  so,  generally  appeared  in  the  "  Stand 
ard."  The  headquarters  of  the  young  people  were- 
now  at  Elmwood  in  Cambridge.  Here  their  oldest 
children  were  born,  and  here  their  oldest  child  died. 
It  was  then  that  Maria  Lowell  wrote  that  charming 
poem  which  has  been  read  with  sympathetic  tears  in 
so  many  homes  from  which  "  the  Good  Shepherd  " 
has  called  away  one  of  his  lambs. 

I  have  often  heard  it  said  that  the  "  Biglow  Pa-  "* 
pers,"  which  followed  soon  after,  introduced  Lowell 
in  England,  and  I  suppose  it  was  so.  You  never  can 
tell  what  they  will  like  in  England,  or  what  they 
will  not  like.  But  this  is  clear,  that,  having  little 
or  no  humor  of  their  own,  they  are  curiously  alive 
for  humor  in  others.  And  the  dialect  of  the  "  Big- 
low  Papers,"  which  is  no  burlesque  or  exaggeration, 
but  simply  perfect  New  England  talk,  is  in  itself 
curious  enough  and  suggestive  enough  to  have  in 
troduced  letters  on  any  theme. 

Literary  people  in  England  still  fancied  that  they 
were  opposed  to  the  principle  of  slavery,  as,  in  truth, 
a  considerable  number  of  them  were.  And  between 


A  MAN  OF  LETTERS  99 

the  outspoken  abolitionists  of  America  and  those  of 
England  there  was  then  a  freemasonry  tender  and 
charming,  though  sometimes  absurd  and  amusing. 
I  suppose  this  first  introduced  the  Biglow  letters, 
with  their  rollicking  fun,  their  absolute  good  sense 
and  vigorous  suggestions,  into  England.  Once  in 
troduced,  they  took  care  of  themselves,  and  went 
wherever  there  were  readers  of  sense  or  even  intelli 
gence.  They  began  in  a  spurt  of  fun  about  a  little 
local  passage  in  Massachusetts  politics. 

"  Fer  John  P. 
Robinson  he 
Sez  he  wunt  vote  fer  Guvnor  B." 

The  success  of  the  first  numbers  naturally  led 
Lowell  to  carry  them  further,  and  they  became  in 
the  end  an  important  factor  in  the  anti-slavery  pol 
itics  of  New  England. 

Meanwhile,  as  our  next  chapter  will  show,  what 
we  now  look  back  upon  as  the  "  lecture  system  "  was 
developing  itself  in  the  Northern  States.  With  the 
ordinary  stupidity  of  ecclesiasticism,  most  of  the  or 
ganized  churches  had  succeeded  in  shutting  out 
from  their  services  the  ultra  speakers  on  whatever 
question.  They  confined  their  sermons  on  Sunday 
to  the  decorous  wish-wash  in  which  average  men 
treated  in  a  harmless  way  subjects  to  which  the  peo 
ple  were  indifferent.  Speaking  of  the  English  pul 
pit  at  the  same  period,  under  conditions  not  far  dif 
ferent,  Jowett  says  :  "  Keally,  I  never  hear  a  sermon 
of  which  it  is  possible  to  conceive  that  the  writer 
has  a  serious  belief  about  things.  If  you  could  but 


100  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

cross-examine  him,  he  would  perjure  himself  every 
other  sentence."  The  indifference  with  which  wide 
awake  Americans,  particularly  of  the  younger  gen 
eration,  regarded  such  preaching,  resulted  in  the 
development  of  the  "  lyceum  system  "  of  the  North. 
Of  this  I  will  speak  in  some  detail  in  the  next 
chapter.  It  is  enough  to  say  here  that  the  or 
ganized  churches  might  thank  themselves  if  they 
found,  introduced  into  every  community  on  week 
days,  the  most  radical  views,  and  frequently  by 
speakers  who  would  not  have  pretended  to  address 
them  on  Sundays.  I  am  trying  not  to  travel  outside 
the  line  which  I  have  marked  for  myself  in  these 
papers  ;  but  I  do  not  pass  that  line  when  I  say 
that  a  sort  of  indignation  was  aroused  through  the 
whole  Northern  community  because  the  established 
church,  in  its  various  communions,  was  unwilling  to 
devote  itself  to  what  was  clearly  its  business,  the 
fair  discussion  of  the  most  important  subject  bearing 
on  right  and  wrong  which  could  possibly  come  be 
fore  any  people.  The  reader  will  find  some  valu 
able  notes  by  Mr.  Higginson,  interesting  of  course, 
in  "  Cheerful  Yesterdays."  "  All  of  which  he  saw, 
and  much  of  which  he  was." 

I  refer  to  this  now  not  because  Lowell  was  often 
engaged  in  lecturing  as  one  of  the  anti-slavery 
speakers.  It  must  be  remembered  that  this  book 
is  not  so  much  a  history  of  his  life,  as  an  effort  to 
show  the  circumstances  which  surrounded  his  life 
and  which  account  for  the  course  of  it.  In  his 
weekly  contributions  to  the  press,  whether  in  prose 
or  in  verse,  he  kept  in  touch  with  the  men  and 


A  MAN  OF  LETTERS  101 

women  who  were  quite  in  advance  in  forming  the 
Northern  or  national  sentiment  of  the  crisis. 

The  "  Liberty  Bell "  and  the  "  Standard/'  with 
his  bright  and  suggestive  articles,  went  into  the 
circles  which  summoned  Parker  and  Phillips  and 
Garrison  to  give  them  instruction  or  inspiration 
which  they  would  have  sought  in  vain  from  the 
more  decorous  pulpits  of  that  day.  So  it  happened 
that,  although  he  did  not  "  enter  the  lecture  field  " 
as  early  as  some  of  his  companions  and  friends 
in  the  anti-slavery  cause,  he  was,  in  those  years  of 
the  awakening,  perfectly  well  known  among  those 
interested  in  that  cause. 

In  this  connection  it  interests  me  to  remember 
that  the  last  time  I  saw  his  father,  Dr.  Lowell,  was 
at  the  house  in  Elmwood  in  1855.  I  went  to  him 
to  ask  for  his  assent  and  signature  in  a  memorial 
relating  to  the  freedom  of  Kansas,  which  was  ad 
dressed  to  what  we  then  called  "  The  Three  Thou 
sand  New  England  Clergymen."  I  went  to  him 
because  he  was  one  of  the  oldest  Congregational 
ministers  in  New  England,  and  because  he  had  al 
ways  deprecated  the  separation  between  the  evan 
gelical  and  liberal  branches  of  that  body.  He  sym 
pathized  heartily  in  what  we  were  doing,  signed  his 
name  at  the  head  of  our  circular-letter,  and  then 
put  his  hand  on  my  head,  and  in  the  most  cordial 
and  pathetic  way  gave  me  and  our  cause  an  old 
man's  benediction.  This,  the  reader  should  note, 
took  place  in  the  spring  of  1855. 


CHAPTER   VIII 

LOWELL    AS    A   PUBLIC    SPEAKER 

IT  will  be  as  well  to  bring  into  one  chapter  such 
references  to  Lowell's  work  as  a  public  speaker  as 
may  give  some  idea  of  the  interest  with  which  he 
was  always  heard,  and,  indeed,  of  his  own  evident 
enjoyment  of  the  position  of  an  orator. 

He  spoke  with  absolute  simplicity,  with  entire 
ease,  and  he  really  enjoyed  public  speaking. 

It  was  near  the  close  of  the  first  quarter  of  the 
century  that  what  was  called  the  "  lyceum  system  " 
came  into  being  in  New  England.  It  worked  won 
derfully  well  under  the  original  plans.  The  institu 
tion,  as  it  may  be  called,  or  the  habit,  if  you  please, 
of  lecturing  and  listening  to  lectures,  was  formed 
again,  probably  never  to  be  abandoned  in  our  com 
munities.  The  method  by  which  this  was  done  in 
the  New  England  towns  worked  well  for  a  genera 
tion.  And  Lowell,  as  a  youngster  starting  on  life, 
made  some  of  his  first  addresses  "under  the 
auspices  "  of  the  old-fashioned  lyceum  committees. 

I  am  rather  fond  of  saying,  what  nobody  seems 
to  care  for  excepting  myself,  that  high  among  the 
causes  which  sent  Winthrop's  colony  to  Massachu 
setts  was  the  passion  of  such  men  as  he  to  hear 
lectures  on  week-days.  Now  this  was  important. 


LOWELL  AS  A  PUBLIC   SPEAKER  103 

It  means  that  the  contest  between  the  "  left  wing  " 
and  the  "  right  wing"  in  the  English  Church  turned 
largely  on  the  wish  of  the  more  advanced  clergy  to 
speak  in  other  pulpits  than  their  own,  and  the  greater 
wish  of  the  Puritan  people  to  hear  them.  Of  course, 
if  a  bishop  could  shut  up  a  man  in  his  own  pulpit, 
the  influence  of  one  of  the  Garrisons,  or  Phillipses, 
or  Parkers,  or  Pillsburys  of  the  day  would  be  very 
much  restricted.  But  so  long  as  John  Cotton  could 
travel  over  half  England,  he  was  much  more  for 
midable  to  Bishop  Laud  and  the  other  people  who 
directed  the  Establishment  than  he  would  have 
been  if  he  had  remained  in  his  own  pulpit  in  the 
Lincolnshire  Boston. 

So  there  grew  up  for  that  generation  the  habit  of 
a  week-day  lecture  in  the  New  England  meeting 
houses  ;  a  habit  preserved  with  more  or  less  interest 
to  the  present  day.  But  as  time  went  by,  these 
week-day  lectures,  so  far  as  I  recollect  them,  were 
little  more  than  the  repetition  of  sermons  which  had 
been  preached  on  Sunday.  Now,  if  there  is  any 
thing  dangerous  anywhere  for  a  lecturer's  usefulness, 
it  is  a  habit  of  repeating  the  average  sermon.  A  ser 
mon  is  one  thing  and  a  lyceum  lecture  is  another.  A 
lyceum  lecture  has  one  purpose,  and  a  sermon  ought 
to  have  another  purpose.  However  this  may  be,  the 
people  of  the  generations  of  this  century  who  did 
not  much  like  to  go  to  the  "  Thursday  lecture  "  in 
Boston,  or  similar  lectures  in  other  towns,  were  very 
glad  to  hear  the  best  speakers  of  the  time.  And 
they  generally  gave  them  more  latitude  than  was  to 
be  found  in  the  creed-bound  churches  of  the  time. 


104  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

I  do  not  think  I  stray  too  far  from  our  central 
subject  if  I  take  a  few  lines  to  speak  of  the  value  to 
the  whole  Northern  community  of  this  very  curious 
system.  To  introduce  such  men  as  have  been 
named  above,  and  a  hundred  other  men,  some  of 
them  of  equal  prominence  in  our  history,  and  all 
of  them  of  a  certain  ability  as  public  speakers,  —  to 
introduce  such  men  to  the  average  community  of 
the  North,  so  that  it  knew  them  personally,  was  in 
itself  a  great  achievement.  To  go  back  to  the  com 
parison  which  I  have  made  already,  these  Peter  the 
Hermits,  passing  from  place  to  place,  preached  a 
crusade.  They  were  in  very  much  the  position  of 
John  Cotton  and  those  other  Puritan  lecturers  whom 
Bishop  Laud  and  the  Star  Chamber  disliked  in  Eng 
land.  And  the  history  of  the  twenty  years  before 
our  Civil  War  is  not  rightly  written  unless  it  refers 
to  the  effect  which  was  wrought  by  such  speakers. 
Phillips,  Parker,  Ward  Beecher,  and  even  Garrison, 
would  have  been  little  known  outside  a  small  circle 
around  their  respective  homes  but  for  this  lecturing 
practice. 

There  will  be  found  in  Lowell's  letters  and  in 
other  memoranda  of  the  time  an  occasional  joke 
about  the  external  hardships  of  the  thing.  He 
speaks  somewhere  of  three  "  committeemen,"  with 
three  cold  hands  like  raw  beefsteak,  welcoming  him 
and  bidding  him  good-by.  But  such  little  jokes 
as  this  must  not  give  a  false  idea  of  the  reception 
which  was  given  to  the  pioneers  of  larger  thought 
than  that  which  the  hidebound  churches  of  the 
time  were  willing  to  interpret.  For  one  such  story 


LOWELL  AS  A  PUBLIC   SPEAKER  105 

of  the  beefsteak  hands  there  could  be  told  a  thou 
sand  stories  of  warm  welcomes  into  charming  fami 
lies,  and  of  immediate  mutual  recognition  of  people 
of  kindred  thought  who  would  never  have  seen  each 
other's  faces  but  for  the  happy  appointment  which 
brought  one  as  a  lecturer  to  the  other  as  "  commit- 
teeman."  Anything  that  taught  the  separated  peo 
ple  of  this  country  that  it  was  a  country,  that  they 
were  citizens  of  the  same  nation,  and  that  they  had 
each  other's  burdens  to  bear,  was  of  great  value  in 
those  days.  The  reader  of  to-day  forgets  that  in 
the  same  years  in  which  South  Carolina  was  defy 
ing  the  North,  Massachusetts  gave  directions  that 
the  national  flag  should  not  float  over  her  State 
House.  That  is  to  say,  in  those  days  there  was  an 
intense  sensitiveness  which  kept  men  of  different 
sections  of  the  country  apart  from  each  other. 
Anything  which  overcame  such  sensitiveness,  and 
brought  real  lovers  of  their  country  and  lovers  of 
God  face  to  face,  was  an  advantage.  In  this  case 
the  advantage  can  hardly  be  overestimated. 

To  this  hour  the  popular  lecture  in  America  dif 
fers  from  the  lecture,  so  called,  which  the  Useful 
Knowledge  Society  of  England,  and  what  they  used 
to  call  Mechanics'  Institutes,  established  there  in 
the  earlier  part  of  the  century.  Mr.  Emerson  told 
me  that  when  he  delivered  his  lectures  in  London, 
intelligent  people  went  back  to  Coleridge's  morning 
lectures,  of  a  dozen  or  more  years  before,  as  a  pre 
cedent.  And  you  see  in  the  accounts  of  Carlyle's 
London  lectures  that  it  was  regarded  as  a  novelty 
that  anything  should  be  said  at  a  lecture  which 


106  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

decently  intelligent  people  needed  to  hear.  But  in 
October,  1843,  Emerson  wrote  to  his  friend  John 
Sterling,  "  There  is  now  a  '  lyceum,'  so  called,  in 
almost  every  town  in  New  England,  and  if  I  would 
accept  an  invitation  I  might  read  a  lecture  every 
night."  Sterling  had  written  to  him  not  long  be 
fore,  "  I  doubt  whether  there  are  anywhere  in  Brit 
ain,  except  in  London,  a  hundred  persons  to  be 
found  capable  of  at  all  appreciating  what  seems  to 
find,  as  spoken  by  you,  such  ready  acceptance  from 
various  bodies  of  learners  in  America."  Such  peo 
ple  meet,  in  their  moribund  feudal  fashion,  "  to 
encourage  the  others,"  as  Sir  Walter  Vivian  looked 
on  the  experiments  in  his  own  park,  or  as  Murat 
charged  at  Borodino.  The  amusing  condescension, 
so  often  observable  in  the  English  pulpit,  is  even 
more  marked  in  the  English  "  popular  lecture." 

But,  in  the  beginning,  it  was  not  so  here.  As 
early  as  1814  Jacob  Bigelow  had  lectured  on  botany 
in  Boston,  and,  not  long  after,  Edward  Everett  on 
Greek  art  and  antiquities,  and  Henry  Ware  on  the 
Holy  Land,  in  courses  of  lectures,  which  were  at 
tended  by  the  very  best  and  most  intelligent  people. 
And  when  Waldo  Emerson,  and  Theodore  Parker, 
and  Wendell  Phillips,  and  James  Lowell  lectured  in 
the  same  region,  they  gave  the  best  they  could  give, 
and  no  one  thought  he  condescended  in  going  to 
hear. 

I  do  not  forget  a  bright  saying  of  Starr  King, 
one  of  those  best  worth  hearing  of  the  brilliant 
group  of  traveling  lecturers  of  whom  Lowell  was 
one.  King  said  that  a  popular  lyceum  lecture 


LOWELL  AS  A  PUBLIC   SPEAKER  107 

was  made  of  five  parts  of  sense  and  five  of  non 
sense.  "  There  are  only  five  men  in  America," 
said  he,  "  who  know  how  to  mix  them  —  and  I 
think  I  am  one  of  the  five."  Other  people  thought 
so  too,  and  did  not  detect  the  nonsense.  His  care 
fully  wrought  lectures  are  worth  anybody's  study 
to-day. 

He  is  the  author  of  another  lyceum  chestnut. 
Some  one  asked  him  what  his  honorarium  was  for 
each  lecture.  "F.  A.  M.  E.,"  said  he  — "Fifty 
And  My  Expenses." 

Lowell's  hearers  got  no  nonsense.  His  subjects 
were  generally  literary  or  critical  —  I  think  always 
so.  On  one  or  more  expeditions  he  went  to  what 
was  then  the  Far  West  —  speaking  in  Wisconsin,  I 
observe,  within  twenty  years  after  Black  Hawk  and 
Keokuk  addressed  Americans  on  the  same  fields. 

(Ah  me  !  Why  did  I  not  accept  forty  acres  of 
land  between  the  lakes  in  Madison,  Wisconsin,  when 
they  were  offered  me  in  1842?  The  reader  will 
perhaps  pardon  this  digression !) 

Of  such  a  system  of  Wander jahre  in  the  educa 
tion  of  a  country,  not  the  least  benefit  is  that  which 
is  gained  by  the  speaker.  No  man  knows  America 
who  has  not  traveled  much  in  her  different  regions. 
A  wise  United  States  Senator  proposed  lately  that 
each  newly  elected  member  of  Congress  should  be 
compelled  to  travel  up  and  down  his  own  country 
for  those  mysterious  months  after  his  election  before 
he  takes  his  seat.  The  men  who  have  had  such  a 
privilege  do  not  make  the  mistakes  of  book-trained 
men. 


108  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

A  good  enough  illustration  of  some  of  the  deeper 
consequences  of  what  may  be  called  the  lyceum 
movement  may  be  found  in  the  story  often  told  of 
the  divided  committee  who  met  Wendell  Phillips  in 
a  place  where  he  was  quite  a  stranger.  On  his  ar 
rival  he  asked  what  was  the  subject  he  was  to  speak 
on.  Should  he  read  his  lecture  on  the  Lost  Arts, 
or  should  he  deliver  an  address  on  Anti-Slavery  ? 
It  proved,  alas !  that  the  committee  was  equally 
divided,  perhaps  bitterly  divided,  and  neither  side 
would  yield  to  the  other.  Phillips  at  once  made  the 
determination  with  his  own  prompt  wit.  He  said 
he  would  deliver  the  lecture  on  the  Lost  Arts  first, 
and  then  the  Anti-Slavery  address  afterwards  for 
any  who  wanted  to  stay  and  hear.  Of  course,  after 
they  had  heard  him,  everybody  stayed,  and  so  he 
had  the  whole  town  to  hear  his  radical  appeal,  where 
otherwise  he  would  have  had  only  that  half  the  town 
which  was  convinced  already. 

Under  a  law  which  may  be  called  divine,  the  stu 
dents,  in  all  colleges  where  they  had  the  choice  of 
anniversary  orators,  always  elected  the  speakers 
who,  as  they  thought,  would  be  most  disagreeable 
to  the  college  government.  So  Emerson,  Parker, 
and  Phillips  came  to  be  favorite  college  speakers  in 
colleges  where  the  faculties  would  gladly  have  sup 
pressed  all  knowledge  of  the  men.  Mr.  Emerson's 
address  at  Dartmouth  in  1838  would  never  have 
been  delivered  but  for  the  action  of  this  law.  This 
address,  when  printed,  lying  on  the  counter  of  a 
book-shop  in  Oxford,  gave  to  Gladstone  his  first 
knowledge  of  the  New  England  Plato. 


LOWELL  AS  A  PUBLIC   SPEAKER  109 

It  is  amusing  now,  and  in  a  way  it  is  pathetic,  to 
see  how  this  youngster  Lowell,  even  before  he  was 
of  age,  caught  at  the  floating  straw  of  a  Lyceum 
engagement  whenever  he  could,  in  the  hope  of  earn 
ing  a  little  money.  This  was  simply  that  he  felt 
the  mortification  which  every  bright  boy  feels  when, 
after  being  told  that  he  is  a  man  by  some  college 
authority,  he  finds  that  he  is  still  living  in  his 
father's  house,  eating  at  his  father's  table,  wearing 
clothes  which  his  father  pays  for,  and  even  asking 
his  father  for  spen ding-money.  There  is  a  note 
from  him  to  Loring  to  ask  if  the  "Andover  Ly 
ceum  "  will  pay  as  much  as  five  dollars  for  a  lecture. 

The  reader  must  understand  that  in  the  "  Lyceum 
system,"  so  called,  it  was  considered  as  a  sort  of 
duty  for  educated  men  to  have  on  hand  a  lecture  or 
two  which  they  were  willing  to  read  to  any  audience 
which  was  willing  to  ask  them.  This  was,  by  the 
way,  in  precise  fulfillment  of  that  somewhat  vague 
commission  which  constitutes  the  degree  of  a  Master 
of  Arts.  The  person  who  is  fortunate  enough  to 
receive  this  diploma  is  told  that  he  has  the  privilege 
of  "  speaking  in  public  as  often  as  any  one  asks  him 
to  do  so."  This  is  my  free  translation  of  "  publice 
profitendi."  Those  words  never  really  meant 
"  public  profession."  In  our  modern  days  we  are  a 
little  apt  to  take  this  privilege  without  the  permis 
sion  of  the  university. 

Educated  men  accepted  such  appointments  as 
their  contribution  to  public  education.  It  was  just 
as  the  same  men  served  on  the  school  committee  or 
board  of  selectmen,  and  would  have  been  insulted 


110  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

if  anybody  had  proposed  to  pay  them  anything  for 
doing  it.  In  many  cases,  perhaps  in  most  cases,  no 
tickets  were  bought  or  sold.  The  selectmen  gave 
the  Town  Hall  for  a  lyceum,  or  the  First  Parish 
gave  the  use  of  its  meeting-house  for  a  lyceum,  as 
they  would  have  done  for  a  temperance  meeting  or 
a  missionary  meeting.  But,  of  course,  it  soon  ap 
peared  that  if  the  audiences  were  to  have  continuous 
courses  of  lectures,  somebody  must  be  paid  for  them, 
and  somebody  must  pay.  College  professors  were 
engaged  to  give  elementary  courses  on  scientific  or 
historical  subjects.  As  early  as  1832  Mr.  Emerson 
delivered  a  course  of  biographical  lectures  at  the 
request  of  the  Massachusetts  Society  for  Diffusing 
Useful  Knowledge.  And  in  the  years  of  the  30's 
in  Boston  there  were  maintained  through  the  winter 
public  courses  almost  every  evening  in  the  week,  by 
at  least  five  different  organizations  —  the  Society  for 
Diffusing  Useful  Knowledge,  the  Boston  Lyceum, 
the  Mercantile  Library  Association,  the  Mechanics' 
Association,  and  sometimes  the  Historical  Society. 
For  all  these  courses  tickets  were  sold  at  low  rates, 
but  for  enough  to  enable  the  societies  to  pay  the 
lecturers  a  small  honorarium.  From  such  arrange 
ments  as  these  the  custom  spread  of  recompensing 
the  lecturer  for  his  work ;  and  at  this  moment,  in 
an  average  New  England  town,  people  will  not  go 
to  a  lecture  if  they  think  the  lecturer  has  "given" 
his  service.  The  public  thinks  that  if  not  worth 
pay,  it  is  not  worth  hearing. 

In  this  arrangement  of  the  lyceum,  Lowell  found 
his  place  before  he  was  of  age.     He  was  always  an 


LOWELL  AS  A  PUBLIC   SPEAKER  111 

easy  and  a  ready  speaker,  and,  as  I  have  said,  he 
enjoyed  public  speaking.  Before  long,  his  interest 
in  the  temperance  reform  and  the  anti-slavery  re 
form  brought  him  occasionally  on  the  platform.  He 
spoke  with  perfect  ease.  On  such  occasions  he 
spoke  without  notes,  never  speaking  without  know 
ing  what  he  had  to  say,  and  always  saying  it.  But 
I  think  he  never  delivered  a  lecture,  as  he  would 
have  called  it,  without  a  manuscript  written  out  in 
full. 

The  first  account  he  gives  of  his  public  speaking 
is  that  of  the  celebration  of  the  Cambridgeport 
Women's  Total  Abstinence  Society  on  the  Fourth 
of  July,  1842.  "  There  were  more  than  three  thou 
sand  in  all,  it  was  said.  I  was  called  out,  and  made 
a  speech  of  about  ten  minutes,  from  the  top  of  a 
bench,  to  an  audience  of  two  thousand,  as  silent  as 
could  be.  I  spoke  of  the  beauty  of  having  women 
present,  and  of  their  influence  and  interest  in  re 
forms.  I  ended  with  the  following  sentiment :  ( The 
proper  place  of  woman  —  at  the  head  of  the  pil 
grims  back  to  purity  and  truth.'  In  the  midst  of 
my  speech  I  heard  many  demonstrations  of  satisfac 
tion  and  approval  —  one  voice  saying,  (  Good  ! '  in 
quite  an  audible  tone.  I  was  told  that  my  remarks 
were  '  just  the  thing.'  When  I  got  up  and  saw  the 
crowd,  it  inspired  me.  I  felt  as  calm  as  I  do  now, 
and  could  have  spoken  an  hour  with  ease.  I  did 
not  hesitate  for  a  word  or  expression  even  once." 

Alas!  the  Boston  papers  of  the  day  had  Mr. 
Tyler's  "  third  veto  "  to  print,  and  the  news  from 
England  by  a  late  arrival;  and  no  word  could  be 


112  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

spared  for  poor  James's  first  essay.  What  saith  the 
Vulgate  ?  "  Nullum  prophetam  in  actis  diurnis 
honorari." 

As  it  proved,  he  was  brought  face  to  face  with 
large  numbers  of  persons  who  would  otherwise  never 
have  seen  him,  by  delivering  lectures  in  various 
courses  through  the  Northern  and  Northwestern 
States ;  but  this  did  not  begin  until  a  period  as  late 
as  1855.  What  I  have  said  of  his  easy  speaking  is 
the  remark  of  a  person  who  heard  him,  as  I  have 
often  heard  him.  I  never  spoke  with  any  one  who 
had  heard  him  who  did  not  say  the  same  thing. 
But  he  himself  did  not  always  feel  the  sort  of  confi 
dence  in  his  power  in  this  way  which  would  have 
seemed  natural.  I  am  told  by  many  persons  who 
had  to  introduce  him  upon  such  occasions,  that  he 
would  be  doubtful  and  anxious  about  his  power  with 
an  audience  before  he  began.  And  he  was  exces 
sively  sensitive  about  any  accident  by  which  he  for 
got  a  word  or  in  any  way  seemed  to  himself  to  have 
tripped  in  his  discourse. 

In  1853  he  was  invited  to  deliver  a  course  of  lec 
tures  before  the  Lowell  Institute.  These  lectures 
were  eventually  delivered  in  January  and  February 
of  1855. 

Because  the  great  system  of  public  instruction 
which  is  carried  on  by  this  Institute  bears  the  name 
of  his  family,  I  will  give  some  little  account  of  it 
here.  Stimulated  by  the  success  of  what  we  have 
been  speaking  of,  the  lyceum  system  of  the  North 
ern  States,  John  Lowell,  Jr.,  a  cousin  of  James 
Russell  Lowell,  had  founded  this  Institute.  His 


JOHN    LOWELL,   JR. 
From  a  painting  by  Chester  Harding,  in  the  possession  of  Augustus  Lowell,  Bosto 


LOWELL  AS  A  PUBLIC  SPEAKER  113 

wife  and  all  his  children  had  died.  His  own  health 
was  delicate,  and  he  undertook  a  long  journey 
abroad.  While  in  Egypt  he  made  his  will,  in  which 
he  left  $250,000  for  the  beginning  of  a  fund  for 
carrying  on  public  instruction  by  means  of  lectures, 
It  is  said  that  it  was  executed  literally  under  the 
shadow  of  the  ruins  of  Luxor. 

By  this  instrument  he  left  to  trustees  the  sum 
which  has  been  named,  the  interest  of  which  should 
be  expended  for  maintaining  free  public  lectures  for 
the  instruction  of  any  who  should  choose  to  attend. 
The  will  provided  that  nine  tenths  of  the  income 
should  be  thus  expended  for  the  immediate  purposes 
of  every  year.  The  remaining  tenth  is  every  year 
added  to  the  principal  fund.  The  investments  have 
been  carefully  and  successfully  made,  and  as  the  will 
went  into  effect  in  the  year  1839,  the  fund  is  now 
very  much  larger  than  it  was  when  he  died. 

It  has  been  admirably  administered  from  the 
beginning.  The  first  Americans  in  the  walks  of 
science  or  of  literature  have  been  proud  to  be 
enrolled  on  the  list  of  its  lecturers,  and  in  many 
instances  the  most  distinguished  savants  from  Eu 
rope  have  been  called  over  with  the  special  purpose 
of  lecturing  to  its  audiences. 

Before  1855  Lowell  was,  I  may  say,  universally 
known  and  universally  admired.  The  announce 
ment  that  he  was  to  deliver  a  course  of  twelve 
lectures  on  English  poetry  was  gladly  received  in 
Boston.  It  proved  at  once  that  it  would  be  neces 
sary  to  repeat  the  lectures  in  the  afternoons  for  a 
new  audience  of  those  who  could  not  enter  the  hall 


114  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

in  the  evening.  But  in  both  afternoon  and  evening 
courses  multitudes  were  turned  away  for  whom  there 
was  no  room  in  the  hall.  A  much  larger  "audi 
ence"  was  made  up  by  the  people  who  read  the 
lectures  from  day  to  day  in  the  newspaper.  My 
father  and  brother,  who  then  conducted  the  "  Daily 
Advertiser,"  arranged  with  Mr.  Lowell  that  his  old 
friend  Mr.  Robert  Carter  should  prepare  the  manu 
script  for  that  paper,  and  thus  the  "Advertiser" 
printed  each  lecture  on  the  day  after  its  second  de 
livery,  with  the  omission  only  of  some  of  the  extracts 
from  the  poets  of  whom  he  was  speaking. 

These  reports  were  carefully  preserved  by  some 
scrap-book  makers,  and  from  one  of  the  scrap-books 
thus  made  the  Rowfant  Club  of  Cleveland  printed 
an  elegant  limited  edition  in  1897. 

I  borrow  from  another  the  description  of  Mr. 
Lowell's  manner  as  a  speaker  in  delivering  these 
and  similar  addresses.  This  writer,  who  is  not 
known  to  me,  says,  first,  that  Mr.  Lowell  never  imi 
tates  the  stump  speaker  and  never  falls  into  the 
drollery  of  the  comedian.  "His  pronunciation  is 
clear  and  precise ;  the  modulations  of  his  voice  are 
unstudied  and  agreeable,  but  he  seldom  if  ever 
raised  a  hand  for  gesticulation,  and  his  voice  was 
kept  in  its  natural  compass.  He  read  like  one  who 
had  something  of  importance  to  utter,  and  the  just 
emphasis  was  felt  in  the  penetrating  tone.  There 
were  no  oratorical  climaxes,  and  no  pitfalls  set  for 
applause." 

The  subjects  of  the  twelve  lectures  are  these  :  1. 
Definitions.  2.  Piers  Ploughman's  Vision.  3.  The 


H      « 

C/3        ~. 


LOWELL  AS  A  PUBLIC  SPEAKER  115 

Metrical  Eomances.  4.  The  Ballads.  5.  Chaucer. 
6.  Spenser.  7.  Milton.  8.  Butler.  9.  Pope.  10. 
Poetic  Diction.  11.  Wordsworth.  12.  The  Func 
tion  of  the  Poet. 

It  is  no  wonder  that  the  lectures  were  so  popular. 
They  are  of  the  best  reading  to  this  day,  full  of 
fun,  full  of  the  most  serious  thought  as  well.  And 
you  find  in  them  at  every  page,  I  may  say,  seeds 
which  he  has  planted  elsewhere  for  other  blossoms 
and  fruit.  For  instance,  here  is  his  description  of 
a  New  England  spring :  — 

"  In  our  New  England  especially,  where  May-day 
is  a  mere  superstition  and  the  May-pole  a  poor,  half- 
hardy  exotic  which  shivers  in  an  east  wind  almost 
as  sharp  as  Endicott's  axe  —  where  frozen  children, 
in  unseasonable  muslin,  celebrate  the  floral  games 
with  nosegays  from  the  milliners,  and  winter  reels 
back,  like  shattered  Lear,  bringing  the  dead  spring 
in  his  arms,  her  budding  breast  and  wan,  dilustered 
cheeks  all  overblown  with  the  drifts  and  frosty 
streaks  of  his  white  beard  —  where  even  Chanti 
cleer,  whose  sap  mounts  earliest  in  that  dawn  of  the 
year,  stands  dumb  beneath  the  dripping  eaves  of  his 
harem,  with  his  melancholy  tail  at  half-mast  —  one 
has  only  to  take  down  a  volume  of  Chaucer,  and 
forthwith  he  can  scarce  step  without  crushing  a 
daisy,  and  the  sunshine  flickers  on  small  new  leaves 
that  throb  thick  with  song  of  merle  and  mavis." 

We  find  much  of  this  again  in  the  "  Biglow 
Papers ; "  perhaps  the  prose  is  better  than  the  verse. 
Indeed,  you  have  only  to  turn  over  the  pages  to 
find  epigrams  of  which  you  might  make  proverbs. 


116  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

"  Fortunately  for  the  ballad-makers,  they  were  not 
encumbered  with  any  useless  information."  "  The 
ballads  are  pathetic  because  the  poet  did  not  try  to 
make  them  so ;  and  they  are  models  of  nervous  and 
simple  diction,  because  the  business  of  the  poet  was 
to  tell  his  story  and  not  to  adorn  it."  "  The  only 
art  of  expression  is  to  have  something  to  express. 
We  feel  as  wide  a  difference  between  what  is  manu 
factured  and  what  is  spontaneous  as  between  the 
sparkles  of  an  electrical  machine  and  the  wildfire  of 
God  which  writes  *  Mene,  MeneJ  on  the  crumbling 
palace  walls  of  midnight  cloud."  "  Even  Shake 
speare,  who  comes  after  everybody  has  done  his 
best,  and  seems  to  say,  (  Here,  let  me  take  hold  a 
minute  and  show  you  how  to  do  it/  could  not  mend 
that," 

Let  no  one  suppose,  because  these  lectures  are 
thus  delivered  to  what  is  called  a  popular  audience, 
that  there  is  anything  slight  in  the  work  or  super 
ficial  in  the  handling.  Lowell  was  not  the  man  to 
slight  his  work  because  he  had  an  audience  of  the 
people,  or  to  treat  the  rank  and  file  with  more 
superficial  consideration  than  the  men  with  epaulets 
or  sashes.  Even  if  he  had  been,  when  he  delivered 
one  of  these  courses  of  lectures  he  had  before  him 
his  full  share  of  the  leaders  of  that  community,  men 
and  women  to  whom  even  a  Philistine  would  not 
dare  bring  the  work  of  a  slop-shop. 

A  good  deal  of  the  thought  of  these  lectures  ap 
pears,  as  I  have  said,  in  other  forms  in  some  of  his 
later  publications.  But,  for  whatever  reason,  he 
never  made  a  separate  book  of  them.  I  think  he 


LOWELL  AS  A  PUBLIC   SPEAKER  117 

says  somewhere  in  a  private  letter  that  he  wanted  to 
do  it,  and  indeed  had  meant  to  do  it,  but  that  he 
could  not  make  the  time  ;  and  that  this  was  a  fair 
excuse  any  one  will  say  who  knows  how  steadily  he 
worked  and  how  much  work  he  had  to  do  in  study, 
in  teaching,  in  writing  and  proof-reading,  and,  in 
after  life,  in  his  diplomatic  duties. 

In  1874  Mr.  Lowell  was  chosen  the  President  of 
the  Harvard  Society  of  Alumni,  and  from  1863  to 
1871  he  was  President  of  the  Phi  Beta  Kappa  of 
Cambridge.  It  is  worth  observing  that  no  other 
President  of  the  Phi  Beta  has  ever  held  that 
position  so  long.  His  immediate  predecessor  was 
Judge  Hoar,  and  his  successor  Eichard  Henry  Dana. 
These  two  societies  exist  chiefly  to  provide  for  the 
annual  dinners  of  Cambridge  graduates  at  the  Col 
lege  on  Commencement  Day  and  the  day  following. 
The  fine  charm  of  the  Phi  Beta  dinner  is  that  it  is 
not  expected  or  permitted  that  anything  that  is  said 
shall  be  reported.  You  may  look  for  the  most 
bubbling  fun  of  some  of  the  most  serious  men  in 

o 

the  world,  without  any  terror  of  seeing  it  bewitched 
and  reflected  the  next  morning  from  the  cracked 
mirror  of  some  ignorant  boy  who,  when  he  reads 
his  notes,  can  see  no  difference  between  Voltaire 
and  Valkyrie.  But  the  Commencement  dinners, 
the  day  before  the  Phi  Beta  dinners,  are  open  to  the 
reports  of  all  men,  angels,  and  devils,  so  that  some 
of  the  sparks  of  Lowell's  infinite  fun  may,  with 
proper  grinding,  be  thrown  upon  the  kodak  still. 

He  officiated  as  President  of  the  Alumni  in  1875 
and  1876.  Those  years,  as  the  centennial  years  of 


118  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

the  early  Revolutionary  events,  kept  every  one  on 
the  alert  as  to  New  England  history.  Here  is  a 
short  extract  from  each  of  these  addresses  :  — 

"  But,  gentlemen,  I  will  not  detain  you  with  the 
inevitable  suggestions  of  the  occasion.  These  sen 
timentalities  are  apt  to  slip  from  under  him  who 
would  embark  on  them,  like  a  birch  canoe  under 
the  clumsy  foot  of  a  cockney,  and  leave  him  floun 
dering  in  retributive  commonplace.  I  had  a  kind  of 
hope,  indeed,  from  what  I  had  heard,  that  I  should 
be  unable  to  fill  this  voice-devouring  hall.  I  had 
hoped  to  sit  serenely  here,  with  a  tablet  in  the  wall 
before  me  inscribed :  ( Guilielmo  Roberto  Ware, 
Henrico  Van  Brunt,  optime  de  Academia  meritis,  eo 
quod  facundiam  postprandialem  irritam  fecerunt.' 
[The  reader  must  recognize  here  the  distinguished 
architects  of  Memorial  Hall,  which  was  then  newly 
built.]  I  hope  you  understood  my  Latin,  and 
I  hope  you  will  forgive  me  the  antiquity  of  the 
pronunciation,  but  it  is  simply  because  I  cannot 
help  it.  Then,  on  a  blackboard  behind  me,  I  could 
have  written  in  large  letters  the  names  of  our 
guests,  who  should  make  some  brave  dumb  show  of 
acknowledgment.  You,  at  least,  with  your  united 
applause,  could  make  yourselves  heard.  If  brevity 
ever  needed  an  excuse,  I  might  claim  one  in  the 
fact  that  I  have  consented,  at  short  notice,  to  be 
one  of  the  performers  in  our  domestic  centennial 
next  Saturday,  and  poetry  is  not  a  thing  to  be  de 
livered  on  demand  without  an  exhausting  wear  upon 
the  nerves.  When  I  wrote  to  Dr.  Holmes  and 
begged  him  for  a  little  poem,  I  got  the  following 


LOWELL  AS  A  PUBLIC   SPEAKER  119 

answer,  which  I  shall  take  the  liberty  of  reading. 
I  do  not  see  the  Doctor  himself  in  the  hall,  which 
encourages  me  to  go  on  :  — 

"  '  My  dear  James,  —  Somebody  has  written  a  note 
in  your  name,  requesting  me  to  furnish  a  few  verses 
for  some  occasion  which  he  professes  to  be  inter 
ested  in.  I  am  satisfied,  of  course,  that  it  is  a  for 
gery.  I  know  you  would  not  do  such  a  thing  as  ask 
a  brother  writer,  utterly  exhausted  by  his  centennial 
efforts,  to  endanger  his  health  and  compromise  his 
reputation  by  any  damnable  iteration  of  spasmodic 
squeezing.  So  I  give  you  fair  warning  that  some 
dangerous  person  is  using  your  name,  and  taking 
advantage  of  the  great  love  I  bear  you,  to  play 
upon  my  feelings.  Do  not  think  for  a  moment  that 
I  hold  you  in  any  way  responsible  for  this  note, 
looking  so  nearly  like  your  own  handwriting  as  for 
a  single  instant  to  deceive  me,  and  suggesting  the 
idea  that  I  would  take  a  passage  for  Europe  in  sea 
son  to  avoid  college  anniversaries.' 

"  I  readily  excused  him,  and  I  am  sure  you  will 
be  kind  enough  to  be  charitable  to  me,  gentlemen. 
I  know  that  one  of  the  things  which  the  graduates 
of  the  College  look  forward  to  with  the  most  confi 
dent  expectation  and  pleasure  is  the  report  of  the 
President  of  the  University.  I  remember  that  when 
I  was  in  the  habit  of  attending  the  meetings  of  the 
faculty,  some  fourteen  or  fifteen  years  ago,  I  was 
very  much  struck  by  the  fact  that  almost  every  field 
of  business  that  required  particular  ability  was  sure 
to  gravitate  into  the  hands  of  a  young  professor  of 
chemistry.  The  fact  made  so  deep  an  impression 


120  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

upon  me  that  I  remember  that  I  used  to  feel,  when 
our  war  broke  out,  that  this  young  professor  might 
have  to  take  the  care  of  one  of  our  regiments,  — 
and  I  know  he  would  have  led  it  to  victory.  And 
when  I  heard  that  the  same  professor  was  nominated 
for  President,  I  had  no  doubt  of  the  result  which 
we  have  all  seen  to  follow.  I  give  you,  gentlemen, 
the  health  of  President  Eliot,  of  Harvard  College! " 

Holding  the  same  honorable  though  honorary 
office  the  next  year,  before  introducing  the  speakers, 
he  said :  — 

"  The  common  consent  of  civilized  mankind  seems 
to  have  settled  on  the  centennial  commemoration  of 
great  events  as  leaving  an  interval  spacious  enough 
to  be  impressive  and  having  a  roundness  of  comple 
tion  in  its  period.  We  are  the  youngest  of  nations, 
and  the  centuries  to  us  are  not  yet  grown  so  cheap 
and  so  commonplace  as  Napoleon's,  when  he  saw 
forty  of  them  looking  down  in  undisguised  admira 
tion  upon  his  armies  bronzed  from  their  triumphs  in 
Italy.  For  my  own  part,  I  think  the  scrutiny  of 
one  age  is  quite  enough  to  bear,  without  calling  in 
thirty-nine  others  to  its  assistance.  It  is  quite  true 
that  a  hundred  years  are  but  as  a  day  in  the  life  of 
a  nation,  are  but  as  a  tick  of  the  clock  to  the  long 
train  of  seons  in  which  this  planet  hardened  itself  for 
the  habitation  of  man  and  man  accommodated  him 
self  to  his  habitation ;  but  they  are  all  we  have,  and 
we  must  make  the  best  of  them.  Perhaps,  after  all, 
it  is  no  such  great  misfortune  to  be  young,  especially 
if  we  are  conscious  at  that  time  that  youth  means 
opportunity  and  not  accomplishment.  I  think  that, 


LOWELL  AS  A  PUBLIC   SPEAKER  121 

after  all,  when  we  look  back  upon  the  hundred  years 
through  which  the  country  has  passed,  the  vista  is 
not  so  disheartening  as  to  the  indigestive  fancy  it 
might  at  first  appear.  If  we  have  lost  something  of 
that  Arcadian  simplicity  which  the  French  travelers 
of  a  hundred  years  ago  found  here,  —  perhaps  be 
cause  they  looked  for  it,  perhaps  because  of  their 
impenetrability  by  the  English  tongue,  —  we  have 
lost  something  also  of  that  self-sufficiency  which  is 
the  mark  as  well  of  provincials  as  of  barbarians,  and 
which  is  the  great  hindrance  to  all  true  advancement. 
It  is  a  wholesome  symptom,  I  think,  if  we  are  begin 
ning  to  show  some  of  the  talent  for  grumbling  which 
is  the  undoubted  heirloom  of  the  race  to  which  most 
of  us  belong.  Even  the  Fourth  of  July  oration  is 
changing  round  into  a  lecture  on  our  national  short 
comings,  and  the  proud  eagle  himself  is  beginning  to 
have  no  little  misgiving  as  to  the  amplitude  between 
the  tips  of  his  wings.  But  while  it  may  be  admitted 
that  our  government  was  more  decorously  adminis 
tered  one  hundred  years  ago,  if  our  national  house 
keeping  to-day  is  further  removed  from  honest 
business  principles,  and  therefore  is  more  costly, 
morally  and  financially,  than  that  of  any  other 
Christian  nation,  it  is  not  less  true  that  the  hun 
dredth  year  of  our  existence  finds  us,  in  the  mass, 
very  greatly  advanced  in  the  refinement  and  culture 
and  comfort  that  are  most  operative  in  making  a 
country  civilized  and  keeping  it  so." 

On  three  occasions,  at  least,  Lowell  substituted 
for  a  prose  lecture  a  poem  to  which  he  gave  the 
name  of  "  The  Power  of  Sound."  It  is  constructed 


122  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

on  the  simple  system  which  runs  back  as  far  as 
"  The  Pleasures  of  Imagination/'  giving  us,  for 
instance,  the  "  Pleasures  of  Hope  "  and  the  "  Plea 
sures  of  Memory."  In  these  prehistoric  days  of 
which  I  write,  it  was  what  you  rather  expected  in  a 
college  poem :  a  convenient  thread  on  which  to 
string  the  beads  which  might  else  have  been  lying 
unused  in  box  or  basket. 

Lowell  gave  the  original  copy  of  this  poem  to 
Mr.  Norton,  who  edited  it  carefully  with  interesting 
notes  for  an  elegant  edition  of  a  few  copies  printed 
by  Mr.  Holden.  Some  of  the  lines  and  several  of 
the  illustrations  in  other  forms  were  used  by  him 
elsewhere,  and  may  be  found  in  his  published 
poems :  — 


"  Steps  have  their  various  meanings  —  who  can  hear 
The  long,  slow  tread,  deliberate  and  clear, 
The  boot  that  creaks  and  gloats  on  every  stair, 
And  the  firm  knock  which  says,  *  I  know  you  're  there,' 
Nor  quake  at  portents  which  so  oft  before 
Have  been  the  heralds  of  the  ten-inch  bore  ? 

"  He  enters,  and  he  sits,  as  crowners  sit, 
On  the  dead  bodies  of  our  time  and  wit ; 
Hopes  that  no  plan  of  yours  he  comes  to  balk, 
And  grinds  the  hurdy-gurdy  of  his  talk 
In  steady  circles,  meaningless  and  flat 
As  the  broad  brim  that  rounds  a  bishop's  hat. 
Nature,  didst  thou  endow  him  with  a  voice, 
As  mothers  give  great  drums  to  little  boys, 
To  teach  us  sadly  how  much  outward  din 
Is  based  on  bland  vacuity  within  ? 

"  Who,  untouched,  could  leave 

Those  Hebrew  songs  that  triumph,  trust,  or  grieve  ? 
Verses  that  smite  the  soul  as  with  a  sword, 


LOWELL  AS  A  PUBLIC   SPEAKER  123 

And  open  all  the  abysses  with  a  word  ? 
How  many  a  soul  have  David's  tears  washed  white, 
His  wings  borne  upward  to  the  Source  of  light ! 
How  many  his  triumph  nerved  with  martyr-will, 
His  faith  from  turmoil  led  to  waters  still ! 
They  were  his  songs  that  rose  to  heaven  before 
The  surge  of  steel  broke  wild  o'er  Marston  Moor, 
When  rough-shod  workmen  in  their  sober  gear 
Rode  down  in  dust  the  long-haired  cavalier  ; 
With  these  once  more  the  Mayflower's  cabin  rang, 
From  men  who  trusted  in  the  God  they  sang, 
And  Plymouth  heard  them,  poured  on  bended  knees, 
From  wild  cathedrals  arched  with  centuried  trees. 
They  were  grim  men,  unlovely  —  yes,  but  great  — 
Who  prayed  around  the  cradle  of  our  State. 
Small  room  for  light  and  sentimental  strains 
In  those  lean  men  with  empires  in  their  brains, 
Who  their  young  Israel  saw  in  vision  clasp 
The  mane  of  either  sea  with  taming  grasp; 
Who  pitched  a  state  as  other  men  pitch  tents, 
And  led  the  march  of  time  to  great  events. 

"  O  strange  new  world,  that  yet  wast  never  young, 
Whose  youth  from  thee  by  tyrannous  need  was  wrung, 
Brown  foundling  of  the  forests,  with  gaunt  eyes, 
Orphan  and  heir  of  all  the  centuries, 
Who  on  thy  baby  leaf-bed  in  the  wood 
Grew'st  frugal  plotting  for  to-morrow's  food; 
And  thou,  dear  Bay  State,  mother  of  us  all, 
Forget  not  in  new  cares  thine  ancient  call ! 

"  Though  all  things  else  should  perish  in  the  sod, 
Hold  with  firm  clutch  thy  Pilgrim  faith  in  God, 
And  the  calm  courage  that  deemed  all  things  light 
Whene'er  the  inward  voice  said,  «  This  is  right  I ' 
If  for  the  children  there  should  come  a  time 
Like  that  which  tried  the  fathers'  faith  sublime 
(Which  God  avert !),  if  Tyranny  should  strive 
On  limbs  New-England-made  to  lock  her  gyve, 
Let  Kansas  answer  from  her  reddened  fields, 
« 'T  is  bastard,  and  not  Pilgrim  blood,  that  yields  ! ' " 

Until  his  death,  his  well-earned  reputation  as  a 


124  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

public  speaker  made  constant  calls  on  him  for  ser 
vice  in  such  directions.  But  no  lover  of  Lowell  will 
suppose  that  lecturing  to  large  audiences  or  to  small 
was  much  more  than  an  "  avocation "  with  him. 
The  "  Fable  for  Critics/'  the  "  Biglow  Papers,"  and 
other  books  belong  to  years  when  he  was  hard  at 
work  as  a  college  professor.  His  contributions  to 
the  journals  which  were  influential  in  reform  still 
continued,  though  not  so  frequent  as  before. 


CHAPTER  IX 

HARVARD    REVISITED 

THE  happiness  of  Lowell's  happy  home  was  shat 
tered  by  the  death  of  his  wife,  October  27,  1853. 
He  spent  the  summer  of  the  next  year  at  Beverly, 
on  the  seashore  of  Massachusetts,  in  the  summer  of 
1855  went  again  to  Europe,  and  returned  in  1856. 
He  at  once  resumed  his  residence  at  Cambridge, 
and,  with  the  opening  term  of  the  autumn,  entered 
heartily  and  energetically  on  his  duty  as  "  Smith 
Professor." 

For  there  was  once  a  gentleman  named  Abiel 
Smith.  He  is  wholly  unknown  to  fame.  But  I 
wish  at  this  late  moment  to  express  the  gratitude, 
hitherto  never  fitly  spoken,  of  thousands  upon  thou 
sands  of  those  whom  he  has  blessed.  He  left  to 
Harvard  College,  as  early  as  1815,  the  foundation 
for  the  Smith  Professorship  of  the  Modern  Lan 
guages. 

He  was  himself  a  graduate  of  Harvard  College  in 
the  year  1764,  "  went  into  business,"  as  our  New 
England  phrase  has  it,  and  became  rich,  as  that 
word  was  used  in  those  early  days.  He  is  spoken 
of  by  Mr.  Quincy  as  a  man  "  of  strong  sense  and 
steady  purpose,  guiding  his  life  by  his  own  convic 
tions  of  duty,  with  little  esteem  for  popular  opinion 


126  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

or  posthumous  fame  ;  scrupulously  just  and  honest ; 
practicing  habits  of  frugality  less  from  regard  to 
wealth  than  out  of  respect  to  the  example." 

It  is  the  fashion  to  laugh  at  the  name  of  Smith  ; 
but  it  must  be  confessed  that  a  good  many  people 
who  have  had  to  go  through  life  under  that  banner 
have  done  the  world  good  service. 

"  Jones  teach  him  modesty  and  Greek, 
Smith  how  to  think,  Burke  how  to  speak." 

This  is  the  Smith  couplet  in  the  fine  account  of  the 
Beefsteak  Club.  If  Abiel  Smith  never  did  as  much 
thinking  as  Adam,  he  must,  all  the  same,  be  remem 
bered  as  a  benefactor.  He  certainly  never  did  so 
much  harm  as  Adam  Smith  has  done,  if  he  has 
not  done  more  good. 

I  am  apt  to  think  that  this  modest  man  was  the 
first  person  in  the  English-speaking  world  to  recog 
nize  the  value  of  the  systematic  study  of  the  modern 
languages  in  any  university  of  England  or  America. 
A  smattering  of  French  was  taught  at  our  Cam 
bridge  as  early  as  1780,  and  Jefferson  studied  some 
French  at  William  and  Mary's  at  about  the  same 
time.  Charles  Bellini  was  made  Professor  of  the 
Modern  Languages  there  in  1781.  This  recogni 
tion  of  the  foreign  languages  of  civilization  was  due 
probably  to  the  Philistine  fact  that  we  were  the 
allies  of  a  Bourbon  king. 

The  first  professor  under  this  Smith  foundation 
was  George  Ticknor,  a  graduate  of  Dartmouth  Col 
lege  of  the  year  1807,  now  known  everywhere  in  the 
world  of  letters  by  his  history  of  Spanish  literature. 
I  found  this  book  the  working  book  of  reference 


HARVARD  REVISITED  127 

in  the  Royal  Library  at  Madrid  —  which,  by  the 
way,  is  the  most  elegant  working  public  library 
I  ever  saw.  Ticknor  was  professor  from  1820  to 
1835.  Henry  Wadsworth  Longfellow  was  his  im 
mediate  successor,  and,  when  Longfellow  resigned 
in  1854,  Lowell  was  appointed  to  succeed  him.  This 
is  a  brilliant  series,  the  honors  of  which  have  been 
well  sustained  since  Lowell  died. 

I  have  seen  it  somewhere  said  that  Lowell  disliked 
the  work  of  a  college  professor.  In  a  way,  I  sup 
pose  this  statement  may  be  literally  true.  That  is 
to  say,  like  other  men  who  know  how  to  work  hard, 
it  was  not  agreeable  to  him  to  be  called  off  at  a  par 
ticular  hour  to  do  a  particular  thing  for  a  particular 
length  of  time,  and  so  far  to  interrupt  the  regular 
line  of  his  study  or  thought  for  the  day.  But  he 
was  not  a  fool,  and  he  accepted  the  universe  frankly. 
So  that,  if  it  were  his  duty  to  walk  down  from  Elm- 
wood  to  the  college  and  see  how  a  particular  class 
was  getting  on  in  Spanish,  or  how  the  particular 
teacher  handled  the  beginners  in  French,  he  could 
do  that  as  well  as  another.  He  would  scold,  in  his 
funny  way,  about  such  interruption  of  his  more  in 
teresting  work,  —  so  do  the  rest  of  us,  —  but  if  the 
thing  were  to  be  done,  he  did  it.  I  say  this  at 
the  beginning  of  what  I  want  to  say  about  his  posi 
tion  at  Cambridge  as  a  teacher. 

In  describing  the  four  years  between  1834  and 
1838,  the  years  of  his  undergraduate  life,  I  tried  to 
give  some  idea  of  what  an  American  college  was  in 
those  prehistoric  times.  Simply,  it  was  a  somewhat 
enlarged  country  "academy."  The  wonder  was 


128  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

that  the  boys  did  not  study  in  the  rooms  in  which 
they  recited,  as  they  would  have  done  in  such  an 
academy.  That  would  have  completed  the  resem 
blance  to  such  a  school.  The  distinction  that  you 
studied  your  lesson  in  your  own  room  and  recited  it 
in  another  building  was  the  principal  distinction  be 
tween  your  work  at  the  Boston  Latin  School,  or 
Leicester  Academy,  and  the  work  which  you  did  in 
college.  Thus,  you  were  told  that  your  lesson  was 
to  be  eighty  lines  of  Euripides' s  "  Hecuba."  You 
sat  down  at  your  task  in  the  evening,  looked  out 
the  words  and  found  out  how  to  read  it,  you  went 
down  the  next  day  and  recited  it,  and  went  back 
again.  That  was  all  which  Hecuba  was  to  you,  or 
you  to  Hecuba.  I  can  conceive  of  nothing  more 
dull. 

Governor  Everett  once  said  very  well  that  a  school 
was  a  place  where  you  recited  a  lesson  which  some 
body  outside  had  taught  you.  This  was  quite  true  in 
those  days.  For  one,  as  I  ought  to  have  said  in  an 
earlier  chapter,  I  had  but  four  teachers  in  college,  — 
Channing,  Longfellow,  Peirce,  and  Bachi.  The 
rest  heard  me  recite  but  taught  me  nothing. 

In  the  twenty  years  between  1834  and  1855,  the 
change  had  begun  at  Cambridge  which  has  made  of 
the  college  of  to-day  an  entirely  different  place,  with 
entirely  different  customs  and  traditions.  It  was  in 
a  great  address  delivered  by  Dr.  Hedge  at  the  Phi 
Beta  Kappa  in  1840  that  the  first  visible  token  of 
this  change  appeared  before  the  somewhat  startled 
gaze  of  corporation,  overseers,  and  graduates.  Dr. 
Hedge  said  squarely  then  that  this  sort  of  school- 


HARVARD  REVISITED  129 

boy  work  could  not  long  continue  in  a  civilized 
country  like  ours,  and  that  everybody  must  go  to 
work  to  lift  the  college  to  a  higher  grade. 

I  think  he  thought  that  the  age  of  undergraduates 
was  to  be  greater  than  it  was  before.  I  think  we 
all  thought  so.  I  am  told,  however,  now,  that  the 
experience  of  the  years  since  that  time  has  not  justi 
fied  this  supposition.  I  believe  that  the  average  of 
the  age  of  the  boys  in  the  college  classes  is  but  a 
few  months  older  than  it  proved  to  be  then.  But 
I  am  disposed  to  think  that  in  the  prehistoric  days 
there  came  in  more  grown  men  —  rather  sporadic 
instances,  indeed,  but  still  a  good  many  of  them  — 
and  that  the  presence  of  these  grown  men  in  the 
classes  raised  the  statistics  of  average  of  those  peri 
ods.  If  two  or  three  queer  antediluvian  fellows  of 
thirty-five  came  into  the  midst  of  a  class  of  fifty 
boys  of  sixteen,  why,  they  screwed  up  the  average 
age  by  several  months.  I  do  not  understand  that 
such  sporadic  cases  occur  very  often  now.  Anyway, 
the  doctrine  of  Dr.  Hedge's  address  is  that  the  col 
lege  shall  open  its  doors  to  teach  what  it  can  teach ; 
that  there  shall  be  a  chance  for  the  teachers  them 
selves  to  be  learning  something  in  the  lines  of  origi 
nal  research,  and  that  every  encouragement  shall 
be  given  to  the  learner  to  follow  the  "  bent  of  his 
genius,"  as  Mr.  Emerson  says  somewhere,  and  that 
he  shall  not  be  made  to  do  certain  things  because 
somebody  else  has  done  them. 

The  line  of  Presidents  of  short  periods,  which  fol 
lowed,  was  a  line  of  men  not  disinclined  to  these 
larger  views.  Neither  Dr.  Sparks,  nor  Dr.  Felton, 


130  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

nor  Dr.  Hill  had  a  long  enough  term  of  office  to 
do  much  in  the  direction  in  which  President  Eliot 
has  so  boldly  stepped  forward.  But  they  were  not 
averse  to  enlarging  the  life  of  the  University.  Cer 
tainly  Lowell  was  in  sympathy  with  any  such  en 
deavor. 

The  Smith  professorship,  as  I  have  intimated, 
gave  opportunity  for  a  pretty  wide  range  of  duty  on 
the  part  of  the  professor.  He  had,  indeed,  a  wider 
range  than  any  other  professor  had  in  any  other 
department.  He  was  virtually  responsible,  as  a  su 
perintendent,  for  the  verbal  instruction  about  nom 
inative  cases  and  verbs  and  der  and  die  and  das, 
which  had  to  be  given,  if  young  men  were  to  know 
anything  about  the  literature  of  the  languages 
taught.  These  languages  were  French,  German, 
Italian,  Spanish,  and  Portuguese.  But  the  real  de 
tail  of  the  instruction  in  these  languages  was  given 
by  people  who  were  called  assistant  professors  or  in 
structors  ;  and  the  professor  himself,  so  far  as  he 
had  a  function  of  his  own,  was  a  lecturer  on  impor 
tant  themes  bearing  on  the  literary  life  of  the  last 
two  or  three  centuries.  As  early  as  Longfellow's 
day,  he  delivered  in  college  a  series  of  lectures  on 
Dante,  which  embodied  much  of  what  one  finds  in 
the  notes  to  his  translation  of  the  poet.  Lowell 
began  his  course  by  reading  to  the  students  the 
lectures  which  he  had  delivered  in  Boston.  In  the 
twenty  years  of  his  active  professorship  he  delivered 
to  them  several  courses  of  similar  lectures. 

If  you  talk  with  any  of  the  men  now  on  the  stage 
who  were  with  him  in  college,  you  find  that  they 


HARVARD  REVISITED  131 

associate  him  especially  with  these  brilliant  lectures 
which  students  liked  to  attend.  But  you  find  much 
more  than  this.  Those  who  knew  him  at  all,  and 
who  took  any  interest  in  the  line  of  study  to  which 
he  was  committed,  remember  him  from  their  per 
sonal  intimacies  with  him.  I  was  myself  much  inter 
ested,  in  the  years  between  1866  and  1870,  in  the 
college  fortunes  of  Frederick  Wadsworth  Loring,  a 
young  fellow  who  died,  too  soon  as  it  seemed,  only 
a  year  after  he  graduated.  He  has  left  behind  quite 
enough  to  justify  those  of  us  who  remember  him  in 
what  we  say  of  his  remarkable  promise.  I  saw  that 
boy  when  he  was  seven  years  old,  sitting  on  a  foot 
stool  at  his  mother's  feet,  reading  Shakespeare 
eagerly.  I  said  to  her,  "  Take  care  !  Pray  take 
care !  "  And  she  said  to  me,  with  an  expression 
which  I  have  never  forgotten,  "  Oh,  we  know  the 
danger,  and  I  think  we  are  careful !  "  And  they 
were.  She  died,  alas  !  in  the  year  1859.  He  was, 
so  to  speak,  pitchforked  into  college,  and  found 
himself  there,  with  his  passionate  enthusiasm  for  lit 
erature  and  poetry,  after  very  hard  and  uncomfort 
able  discipline  at  a  poor  country  academy.  And  at 
Cambridge,  as  in  Lowell's  time,  there  was  chapel 
which  must  be  attended,  there  was  this  and  that 
which  must  be  learned,  and  so-and-so  which  must 
be  done.  And  here  was  Loring,  wild  about  the 
majestic  achievements  of  the  great  poets.  He  was 
utterly  indifferent  as  to  the  systems  of  Ptolemy  or 
of  Newton  ;  and  the  world  might  have  rolled  back 
ward  for  five  years  without  his  caring.  Yet  must  is 
must,  and  he  had  to  pretend  to  study  mathematics. 


132  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

What  would  have  happened  to  the  dear  boy  but 
for  the  existence  of  two  men,  I  do  not  know ;  but, 
fortunately  for  him  and  for  those  who  loved  him, 
here  was  Lowell  at  the  head  of  the  department  of 
modern  languages,  and  Elbridge  Jefferson  Cutler 
at  the  head  of  the  English  subdivision.  And,  after 
four  years  of  Loring's  college  life,  which  was  of  value 
to  him  that  no  man  can  pretend  to  describe,  he  grad 
uated.  I  think,  indeed,  that  they  gave  him  a  poem 
at  Commencement.  I  have  never  forgotten  that 
when  I  was  at  the  "  spread  "  in  Hoi  worthy,  where 
Loring  modestly  entertained  his  friends  on  Class 
Day,  I  met  Cutler,  and  I  said  to  him,  "  Well,  Cutler, 
you  have  got  Fred  through."  "  Yes,"  he  said,  "  we 
have  dragged  him  through  by  the  hair  of  his  head." 

"  We  "  meant  Lowell  and  himself.  They  were 
perfectly  determined  that  this  brilliant  young  poet 
should  get  what  could  be  got  out  of  the  university. 
They  were  perfectly  determined  that  no  wayward 
ness  of  his  own  should  break  up  the  regular  course 
of  life  which  offered  such  promise.  And  if  I  told 
some  of  the  stories  of  the  affectionate  way  in  which 
those  two  distinguished  men  cared  for  the  life  of 
this  distinguished  boy,  it  would  be  a  story  out  of 
which  some  one  who  knew  how  to  hold  a  pen  could 
make  a  fascinating  romance  or  drama.  It  would, 
perhaps,  do  something  to  remove  the  preposterous 
and  ridiculous  impression  of  the  more  foolish  under 
graduate  that  "  the  faculty  "  hates  him. 

On  the  catalogue  Mr.  Lowell's  position  as  Smith 
Professor  covers  thirty  years.  In  1886  he  resigned 
to  be  appointed  "Professor  Emeritus,"  and  so  his 


HARVARD  REVISITED  133 

name  remains  on  the  college  catalogue  until  his 
death.  In  1865  he  had  the  welcome  relief  of  the 
appointment  of  Mr.  Cutler  as  an  assistant.  The  de 
partment  was  gradually  enlarged  with  the  enlarge 
ment  of  the  college,  but  for  thirty  years  it  was 
under  Mr.  Lowell's  general  administration,  except 
ing  during  his  journeys  in  Europe  and  his  diplo 
matic  residence  in  Madrid  and  in  London. 

This  boy  of  1838  left  college  to  try  the  experi 
ments  of  life,  not  really  knowing  what  life  had  for 
him.  In  the  seventeen  years  between  1838  and 
1855  he  had  been  in  Europe  two  or  three  times, 
and,  as  the  reader  knows,  he  had  spent  a  part  of  one 
winter  in  Philadelphia.  But  Cambridge  had  been 
his  home  most  of  the  time,  and  he  had  seen  step  by 
step  the  changes  which  made  this  "  academy "  or 
"seminary"  into  a  university.  Some  of  the  offi 
cers  still  remained  to  whom  he  had  recited  when  in 
college. 

Josiah  Quincy  had  been  succeeded  as  President 
by  Edward  Everett,  and  Jared  Sparks,  and  James 
Walker,  the  last  of  whom  was  now  the  President. 

Dr.  Walker's  name  may  not  be  universally  known 
among  students  in  all  parts  of  this  country,  es 
pecially  by  men  of  those  religious  schools  who  made 
it  a  duty  to  brand  him  and  the  men  of  his  com 
munion  as  infidels.  But  it  is  safe  to  say  that  no 
man  was  in  college  during  the  twenty-two  years  in 
which  he  was  professor  and  president  who  does  not 
remember  him  with  gratitude  and  speak  of  him  with 
enthusiasm.  From  1838  to  1853  he  was  the  Pro 
fessor  of  Natural  Eeligion  and  Moral  Philosophy. 


134  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

He  lectured  on  these  subjects  in  the  Lowell  Insti 
tute.  He  often  preached  in  the  college  pulpit,  and 
to  this  day,  when  you  meet  any  of  his  old  hearers, 
you  will  find  that  they  hark  back  to  him  and  what 
he  said  to  them  with  distinct  memory  of  the  lessons, 
practical  and  profound,  which  he  enforced. 

Not  long  before  the  close  of  his  life  he  supplied 
for  one  winter  the  pulpit  of  a  church  a  little  away 
from  the  centre  of  Boston.  Every  Sunday  saw  a 
procession  of  his  old  pupils,  twenty  years  older,  per 
haps,  than  they  were  as  undergraduates,  who  gladly 
seized  this  occasion  to  profit  by  the  wisdom  of  their 
old  counselor. 

Cornelius  Conway  Felton,  to  whom  I  have  already 
referred  in  speaking  of  the  Mutual  Admiration  So 
ciety,  succeeded  Dr.  Walker.  He  had  been  Greek 
Professor  when  Lowell  was  an  undergraduate.  His 
successor,  Dr.  Thomas  Hill,  graduated  five  years 
after  Lowell. 

Of  his  old  professors  Lowell  found  in  office  Lover- 
ing  and  Benjamin  Peirce.  There  were  one  or  two 
instructors  in  the  modern  languages  who  had  sur 
vived  the  interval,  but  for  the  rest  his  coadjutors 
had  been  appointed  since  his  graduation. 

The  college  had  been  taking  on  her  larger  methods 
in  those  seventeen  years,  and  during  what  was  left 
of  his  life  he  saw  and  assisted  in  other  changes 
larger  yet.  From  the  beginning  he  cut  red  tape  or 
threw  it  away.  He  cultivated  close  acquaintance 
with  the  young  men  whom  he  met  in  his  classes,  and 
he  and  the  men  of  his  type  have  done  much  to 
bring  about  interest  and  sympathy  between  teacher 


CORNELIUS   CONWAY   FELTON 


HARVARD   REVISITED  135 

and  taught,  such  as  was  hardly  dreamed  of  in  Cam 
bridge  in  the  first  half  of  the  century.  The  two 
volumes  of  his  published  letters  give  a  charming 
view  of  his  relations  with  Longfellow,  Norton,  Cut 
ler,  and  other  professors  of  his  time,  and,  indeed,  of 
the  cordial  social  life  of  Cambridge.  Of  these  gen 
tlemen  I  have  something  I  should  like  to  say  in 
another  paper  of  this  series.  But  this  is  the  better 
place  to  allude  to  the  young  poet,  Hugh  Clough, 
who  is  alluded  to  in  Lowell's  correspondence  with 
his  associates  in  Cambridge.  Clough  came  to  Cam 
bridge,  as  I  have  always  supposed,  in  the  real  hope 
of  adapting  himself  to  American  life,  or  life  in  a 
republic,  where  "  I  am  as  good  as  the  other  fellow, 
and  the  other  fellow  is  as  good  as  I."  Alas  and 
alas !  how  many  of  us  have  seen  Englishmen  who 
tried  this  great  experiment,  who  made  the  great 
emigration,  and  then  were  obliged  to  go  back  to 
the  leeks  of  Egypt !  I  do  not  know  that  it  was  so 
with  Clough,  but  I  think  it  was. 

People  who  remember  his  "  Bothie  of  Tober-na- 
Vuolich  "  (and  they  are  not  so  many  as  there  should 
be)  will  recollect  that  that  charming  poem  closes  as 
white  handkerchiefs  are  waved  in  an  adieu  when 
the  English  steamer  leaves  her  dock  and  sails  with 
the  hero  and  heroine  for  Australia  —  "a  brave  new 
land,"  without  fuss  and  without  feathers,  without 
feudalism  and  the  follies  of  feudalism ;  a  land  of 
freedom. 

"  Fiye  hundred  pounds  in  pocket,  with  books,  and  two  or  three  pic 
tures, 

Tool-box,  plow,  and  the  rest,  they  rounded  the  sphere  to  New  Zea 
land.  .  .  . 


136  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

"There  hath  he   farmstead  and  land,  and  fields  of  corn  and  flax 

fields, 
And  the  Antipodes  too  have  a  Bothie  of  Tober-na-Vuolich." 

And  other  readers  will  remember  that,  for  nearly 
a  generation,  more  than  half  the  English  novels 
which  turned  out  well,  ended  thus,  in  a  flourish  of 
trumpets  in  which  anybody  who  was  good  for  any 
thing  went  away  from  England.  Even  Carlyle's 
Chartism  had  nothing  better  to  propose  than  that 
England  should  send  away  the  people  she  did  not 
know  how  to  take  care  of  at  home.  Among  them 
Clough  came,  but  apparently  he  was  too  old.  He 
went  back  to  England,  and,  I  think,  accepted  a 
government  office  —  not,  perhaps,  inspector  of  slate- 
pencils,  but  something  not  more  edifying.  He  died 
in  1862,  in  Florence. 

He  was  a  charming  poet,  and  I  cannot  but  think 
a  charming  companion.  I  always  think  of  him  as  a 
bishop  "  in  partibus,"  a  bishop  without  a  mitre  or 
a  see.  For  Mr.  Emerson  told  me  an  interesting 
story  of  Clough.  He  was  one  of  a  cluster  of  young 
men  who  had  taken  great  delight  in  Emerson,  on 
his  visit  in  1848  in  England.  When  that  visit  was 
over,  and  Mr.  Emerson  sailed  for  America  on  his 
return,  Clough  accompanied  him  to  Liverpool  and 
bade  him  good-by  on  the  deck  of  the  steamer.  As 
they  walked  up  and  down  the  deck  together,  Clough 
said  sadly,  "  What  shall  we  do  without  you  ? 
Think  where  we  are.  Carlyle  has  led  us  all  out 
into  the  desert,  and  he  has  left  us  there  "  —  a  re 
mark  which  was  exactly  true.  Emerson  said  in 
reply  that  very  many  of  the  fine  young  men  in 


HARVARD  REVISITED  137 

England  had  said  this  to  him  as  he  went  up  and 
down  in  his  journeyings  there.  "  And  I  put  my 
hand  upon  his  head  as  we  walked,  and  I  said, 
*  Clough,  I  consecrate  you  Bishop  of  all  England. 
It  shall  be  your  part  to  go  up  and  down  through 
the  desert  to  find  out  these  wanderers  and  to  lead 
them  into  the  promised  land.' ' 

I  do  not  know,  but  I  am  afraid  that  Clough  never 
thought  himself  in  the  promised  land,  nor  scarcely 
upon  any  Pisgah  looking  down  upon  it.  But  I  tell 
the  story,  as  showing  how  highly  Emerson  thought 
of  Clough  as  far  back  as  1849. 

As  I  have  said,  LoweU  succeeded  Longfellow, 
who  had  come  to  Cambridge  when  Lowell  was  a 
sophomore ;  and  Lowell,  like  every  one  else  who 
worked  under  Longfellow,  was  always  grateful  to 
him.  Longfellow  began,  all  too  early,  the  habit  of 
speaking  of  himself  as  an  old  man.  But  the  pub 
lished  volumes  of  his  own  life  show  how  diligent 
and  active  he  was,  and  that  he  considered  his  relief 
from  the  daily  work  of  his  professorship  as  simply 
an  opportunity  for  wider  work  in  literature. 

By  his  boundless  liberality  to  every  child  of  sor 
row  he  had  made  Cambridge  the  Mecca  of  a  poly 
glot  pilgrimage  in  which  any  European  exiles  who 
could  read  or  write  came  of  course  to  the  Craigie 
House  to  ask  for  his  patronage  and  assistance. 
With  Mr.  Lowell's  arrival  there  were,  I  think,  no 
fewer  of  such  visitors  at  the  Craigie  House ;  but  by 
the  law  of  the  instrument  they  found  their  way  by 
the  pleasant  shady  walk  which  leads  from  Long 
fellow's  home  to  Elm  wood  and  Mount  Auburn. 


138  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

I  remember  among  these  an  accomplished  gentle 
man,  who  worked  in  America  in  the  anti-slavery 
cause,  in  ante-bellum  days.  He  always  was  grate 
ful  to  Longfellow  for  his  assistance  to  him,  which 
came  at  a  time  when  it  was  most  needed.  Heinrich 
von  Hutten  was  a  lineal  descendant,  I  think,  of 
Ulrich  von  Hutten,  the  poet  of  the  Keformation. 
He  came  to  this  country  in  the  suite  of  Kossuth, 
who  ought,  perhaps,  to  have  been  spoken  of  else 
where  in  this  series.  Von  Hutten  gave  his  life  and 
strength,  and  perhaps  his  blood,  to  the  Hungarian 
cause.  After  his  arrival  here  he  was  employed  by 
a  publishing  firm  to  translate  Mrs.  Stowe's  "  Uncle 
Tom's  Cabin  "  into  the  German  language.  After 
he  had  begun,  there  was  a  terror  lest  a  rival  trans 
lation  should  be  finished  before  his,  and  the  good 
Von  Hutten  worked  day  and  night  —  too  much, 
alas  !  by  night  —  in  completing  the  work  assigned 
to  him.  The  story  always  reminds  me  of  Milton's 
sonnet, 

"  What  sustains  me,  dost  thou  ask  ? 
The  conscience,  friend,  to  have  lost  them  overplied 
In  Liberty's  defense,  my  noble  task," 

for  he  really  lost  his  eyes  in  the  cause  of  freedom. 

Longfellow  was  kind  to  him,  Lowell  was  kind  to 
him,  and,  indeed,  he  was  a  man  who  deserved  to 
have  friends  everywhere.  When  I  was  in  Europe 
in  1873,  I  was  glad  to  hear  that  the  good  Von 
Hutten  was  living  again  in  the  castle  of  his  ances 
tors  upon  the  Danube  River.  It  was  one  of  the 
minor  misfortunes  of  my  life  that  I  was  not  able  to 
accept  his  invitation  to  visit  him  there. 


HARVARD  REVISITED  135 

• 

As  I  have  said,  it  has  been  intimated  that  Lowell 
chafed  under  the  regular  requisitions  of  the  duties 
of  a  professor.  And,  as  I  have  said,  most  men  do 
chafe  a  little  when  they  find  that  on  a  given  day 
they  are  expected  to  do  a  given  thing  where  they 
want  to  do  something  else.  It  must  be  discoura 
ging  to  have  a  class  of  boys  around  you  to  whom  a 
lesson  is  simply  a  bore,  and  to  know  that  you  will 
hear,  at  twenty-seven  minutes  after  eleven,  the  same 
stupid  mistake  which  you  heard  made  at  twenty-six 
minutes  after  eleven,  three  hundred  and  sixty-five 
days  ago.  In  his  private  letters  there  is  occasion- 
allv  an  expression,  sometimes  serious  and  sometimes 
ffav.  of  the  dislike  of  the  necessarv  slaverv  which 

e   .  -  J  - 

follows  on  such  work.  But  he  had  accepted  it,  for 
better  for  worse,  and  went  through  with  it  loyally. 
He  liked  the  intercourse  which  his  work  gave  him 
with  young  men  of  promise,  and  availed  himself 
gladly  of  every  opportunity  to  make  the  intercoone 
of  advantage  to  them.  In  a  ("-harming  and  sugges 
tive  paper  by  Professor  Barrett  Wendell,  which  was 
published  in  "  Scribner's "  immediately  after  Low 
ell's  death,  there  is  such  detail  as  only  a  college  pro 
fessor  could  write  of  some  of  the  methods  and  habits 
in  which  Lowell  grew  into  a  friendly  intimacy  with 
his  pupils.  He  assigned  one  evening  in  a  week 
when  they  might  call  to  see  him,  and  he  was  so 
cordial  then  that  they  took  the  impression  that  he 
liked  to  see  thenu  and  would  go  up  on  anv  evening 
when  they  chose.  I  am  favored  with  the  private 
journal  of  one  of  these  pupils,  in  which  are  many 
anecdotes,  some  even  pathetic,  of  the  cordial  inter- 


140  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

course  he  had  with  them.  Professor  Wendell  gives 
a  valuable  account  of  his  own  experience  with  Low 
ell.  He  had  never  studied  any  Italian,  and  yet  he 
boldly  resolved  that  he  would  ask  Lowell's  permis 
sion  to  attend  his  lectures  on  Dante,  though  he  had 
no  knowledge  of  the  Italian  language.  Lowell  was 
pleased,  perhaps  was  interested  in  seeing  what  so 
bright  a  boy  would  do  under  such  circumstances ; 
and  the  result  of  this  was,  as  Mr.  Wendell  says, 
"  at  the  end  of  a  month  I  could  read  Dante  better 
than  I  ever  learned  to  read  Greek  or  Latin  or  Ger 
man."  Remember  this,  gentlemen  who  are  taking 
nine  years  to  teach  a  boy  to  read  Latin ;  and  reflect 
that  Mr.  Wendell  reads  his  Latin  as  well  as  the  best 
of  you. 

I  think  the  reader  may  indulge  me  in  a  little 
excursus  when  I  say  a  few  words  seriously  to  the 
undergraduates  of  to-day  with  regard  to  this  form 
of  cordial  intercourse  between  them  and  their  pro 
fessors.  We  used  to  say,  when  I  was  in  college, 
that  we  wished  the  professors  would  treat  us  as  gen 
tlemen.  The  wish  is  a  very  natural  one.  I  have 
had  many  classes  myself  in  the  fifty  or  sixty  years 
which  have  followed,  and  I  have  always  tried  to  live 
up  to  that  undergraduate  theory.  I  have  treated 
my  pupils  as  if  they  wanted  to  learn  and  were  gen 
tlemen,  and  their  honor  could  be  relied  upon.  Look 
ing  back  on  it,  I  think  I  should  say  that  about  half 
of  them  have  met  me  more  than  halfway.  But  — 
and  here  lies  the  warning  which  I  wish  to  give  to 
undergraduates  —  the  other  half  have  taken  an  ell 
where  I  gave  an  inch.  Because  I  did  not  crowd 


HARVARD  REVISITED  141 

them  they  did  nothing;  they  considered  ine  a 
"  soft "  person,  and  my  course  a  "  soft "  course.  In 
other  words,  they  shirked,  simply  because  I  did  not 
treat  them  with  the  methods  of  a  low-grade  gram 
mar-school. 

Young  gentlemen,  then,  ought  to  consider  how 
far  they  are  themselves  responsible  for  any  supposed 
harshness  or  mechanical  habit  on  the  part  of  the 
gentlemen  who  really  know  more  than  they  do,  and 
who  are  willing  to  trust  them  in  their  work.  I  had 
the  honor  last  spring  of  being  appointed  as  one  of 
the  judges  of  some  prose  exercises  in  one  of  our 
older  colleges.  I  was  proud  and  glad  to  give  the 
time  which  the  examination  of  these  exercises  re 
quired.  What  did  I  find?  I  found,  of  three  dif 
ferent  papers  submitted  to  me  in  competition  on  the 
same  subject,  that  all  the  writers  had  stolen,  from 
reviews  which  they  supposed  would  not  be  known, 
long  passages,  and  copied  them  as  their  own.  In 
this  particular  case,  it  happened  that  the  three  writ 
ers  were  so  ignorant  of  the  literature  of  the  last  half- 
century  that  they  copied  the  same  passage,  hoping 
that  the  judges  of  their  exercises  would  be  ignorant 
enough  to  be  deceived.  Is  it  not  rather  hard  to  be 
told  that  you  are  to  "  treat  as  gentlemen "  black 
guards  like  these,  who  are  willing  to  tell  lies  for  so 
petty  a  purpose  as  was  involved  in  this  endeavor? 
I  should  say  that  the  Greek-letter  societies  have  it 
in  their  power  to  do  a  good  deal  to  tone  up  the 
undergraduate  conscience  in  such  affairs. 

To  return  to  Lowell:  He  was  quite  beyond  and 
above  confining  himself  to  the  requisitions  of  his 


142  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

profession.  As  an  instance  of  his  generosity  in  this 
way,  in  the  winter  of  1865  he  offered  to  the  divinity 
students  to  come  round  to  them  and  lecture  famil 
iarly  to  them  on  the  medieval  idea  of  hell  as  it  may 
be  gathered  from  Dante.  This  was  no  part  of  the 
business  of  his  chair.  He  volunteered  for  it  as  the 
reader  of  these  lines  might  offer  to  take  a  class  in  a 
Sunday-school.  I  remember  that  some  of  the  stu 
dents  took  a  notion  that  he  pinched  himself  by  his 
generous  help  to  those  whom  he  thought  in  need. 
One  of  his  pupils  told  me  that  Lowell  offered  him  a 
Christmas  present  of  valuable  books,  under  the  pre 
text  that  he  was  thinning  out  his  book-shelves.  "  I 
declined  them/'  said  my  friend,  "  simply  from  the 
feeling  that  he  could  not  afford  to  give  them.  I 
need  not  say/'  he  says,  "that  I  am  sorry  for  this 


now." 


I  am  favored  by  Mr.  Robert  Lincoln,  who  was 
fortunate  enough  to  be  one  of  his  pupils,  with  the 
following  memoranda  of  the  impression  which  he 
made  upon  them  :  — 

DEAR  DOCTOR  HALE, — My  only  association  with 
Mr.  Lowell  in  college  was  as  a  member  of  a  small 
class  who  "  went  through  "  Dante  under  his  super 
vision.  Our  duty  was  to  prepare  ourselves  to  trans 
late  the  text,  and  Mr.  Lowell  heard  our  blunderings 
with  a  wonderful  patience,  and  rewarded  us  with 
delightful  talks  on  matters  suggested  in  the  poem ; 
but  we  had  no  set  lecture.  My  experience  (that  is, 
at  Harvard),  therefore,  only  permits  me  to  speak  of 
him  as  a  professor  in  the  recitation-room.  In  that 


HARVARD  REVISITED  143 

relation  his  erudition,  humor,  and  kindness  made 
me,  and  I  am  sure  all  my  associates,  enjoy  the  hour 
with  him  as  we  did  no  other  college  exercise.  I  can 
sincerely  say  that  it  is  one  of  my  most  highly  cher 
ished  experiences.  With  us  he  was  always  conver 
sational,  and  flattered  us  and  gained  us  by  an 
assumption  that  what  interested  him  interested  us. 
When  now  I  take  up  my  Dante,  Mr.  Lowell  seems 
to  be  with  me.  .  .  . 

Always  sincerely  yours, 

EGBERT  T.  LINCOLN. 

It  will  be  seen  that  the  impression  made  on  Mr. 
Lincoln,  and  his  memories  of  Lowell,  are  similar  to 
those  of  Mr.  Wendell. 

From  the  journal  to  which  I  have  referred  I  copy 
the  following  passages :  — 

"June  12,  1865,  I  went  to  look  at  the  scenery 
from  Mount  Auburn  tower.  Returning,  I  found 
the  serene  possessor  of  Elmwood  in  good  spirits,  ate 
a  Graham  biscuit  and  drank  some  delicious  milk 
with  him  and  his  wife,  then  enjoyed  a  very  pleasant 
conversation.  He  read  some  of  Shakespeare's  son 
nets,  to  make  me  think  better  of  them,  and  suc 
ceeded.  His  noble  old  dog  Argus  had  been  poisoned, 
and  in  Argus's  place  he  had  a  young  Newfoundland 
pup  which  he  called  Bessie,  as  black  Aggy  Green, 
on  Port  Royal  Island,  named  her  pet  sow  !  He  gave 
me  a  very  welcome  copy  of  Macaulay's  essays  and 
poems,  and  the  little  visit  was  another  oasis  in 
school  life's  dearth  of  home  sociability.  Mabel,  his 
only  child,  was  not  there  at  supper,  but  came  home 


144  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

some  time  after :  '  Salute  your  progenitor ! '  and 
the  answer  was  a  daughter's  kiss. 

"  In  September,  1865,  he  offered  to  conduct  the 
divinity  students  into  Dante's  conception  of  hell, 
and  as  far  out  as  time  would  allow.  He  read  the 
first  canto  through  for  introduction,  and  gave  me 
the  second  for  our  first  trial.  I  went,  because  I 
wanted  to  become  inured,  lest  I  might  have  to  con 
duct  somebody  else.  He  had  too  many  other  duties, 
was  somewhat  unwell,  cut  the  Dante  for  both  days 
of  a  week  three  or  four  times,  some  of  the  readers 
were  not  Italian  enough  to  read  easily,  and  on  De 
cember  13  he  gave  us  up  as  a  lost  tribe  of  the  race 
of  Adam.  January  19, 1866, 1  was  his  guest  again, 
clear  even  of  the  central  frozen  bolgia.  After  din 
ner  he  gave  me  a  card  to  Longfellow,  whom  I  found 
about  four  o'clock  at  his  dinner." 

The  same  accurate  critic  writes  :  — 

"  In  Lowell's  college  work  the  weakest  part  was 
his  class  teaching.  While  no  teacher  in  the  univer 
sity  was  more  willing  to  help  his  boys,  his  habit  of 
doing  most  of  the  reading,  when  a  boy  labored, 
with  friction,  breaking  right  into  his  reading,  was 
not  agreeable  to  the  boy.  But  even  in  that  he  at 
least  had  the  courage  of  mastery,  and  never  shirked 
the  hard  passages.  His  corrections  and  remarks 
were  often  lost  from  the  want  of  clearness  and 
open-mouthed  carefulness  of  articulation.  When  he 
spoke  in  public  he  always  made  himself  heard ;  but 
to  a  small,  almost  private  class,  speaking  without 
effort,  his  modest  stillness  and  his  smothering  mus 
tache  would  make  us  wish  that  men's  hair  had  been 


HARVARD  REVISITED  145 

forbidden  to  grow  forward  of  the  corner  of  their 
mouths." 

I  must  postpone  other  references  to  Mr.  Lowell's 
life  with  his  students  to  the  next  chapter,  which  will 
speak  of  him  in  his  relations  to  the  civil  war, 
which  followed  so  soon  after  his  appointment  at 
Cambridge.  His  home  at  Cambridge  for  much  of 
the  first  two  years  of  his  professorship  had  been 
with  Dr.  and  Mrs.  Howe,  in  Kirkland  Street.  In 
September,  1857,  he  was  able  to  return  to  Elmwood 
and  reestablish  family  life,  after  his  fortunate  and 
happy  marriage  to  Miss  Frances  Dunlap. 

Every  person  who  has  had  any  experience  in 
teaching  knows  that  the  great  danger  to  a  school 
master  or  a  professor  is  that  he  shall  know  but  little 
of  what  passes  outside  his  own  cocoon.  There  is 
an  old  satirical  fling  which  says  that  a  schoolmaster 
is  a  man  who  does  not  take  the  voyage  of  life  him 
self,  but  stands  on  the  gangway  of  the  steamer  to 
pass  those  along  who  are  going  to  take  it.  This  is 
not  true,  but  it  has  just  foundation  enough  to  give 
point  to  the  satire,  and  to  give  suggestion  to  those 
who  are  in  danger. 

The  danger  is  that  a  man  shall  think  that  half 
the  world  is  contained  in  the  ring-fence  which  in 
closes  the  territory  where  they  hear  his  academy 
bell.  Can  you  conceive  of  a  better  antidote  for  his 
sweet  poison,  or  a  better  rescue  from  his  dangers, 
than  the  occupation  of  an  editor?  Mr.  Lowell,  in 
handling  the  "  North  American  "  and  the  "  Atlan 
tic,"  had  to  see  that  there  were  people  quite  as 
much  interested  in  life  as  he,  who  lived  in  Texas 


146  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

and  in  Washington  Territory  and  in  the  Sandwich 
Islands  and  in  New  Zealand.  He  did  not  open  a 
morning's  mail  but  it  taught  him  that  the  world, 
while  it  is  a  very  small  place,  is  a  small  place  which 
has  some  very  large  conditions.  He  was  that  sort 
of  a  man  that  his  nature  could  never  have  been 
petty  or  provincial;  but  the  avocations  which  edi 
torial  life  brought  him  would  of  themselves  have 
made  him  cosmopolitan. 


CHAPTER  X 

LOWELL'S  EXPERIENCE  AS  AN  EDITOR 

LOWELL'S  whole  life  was  a  literary  life,  from  the 
days  of  the  "  Boston  Miscellany  "  and  of  the  "  Pio 
neer."  And  I  am  well  aware  that  these  notes  will 
be  read  with  a  certain  special  interest  by  young 
people  who  are  asking  themselves  whether  litera 
ture,  as  such,  offers  "a  career"  to  those  who  are 
entering  upon  life. 

It  required  much  more  resolution  to  determine  on 
such  a  career  in  America  in  1841  than  it  does  now. 
I  will  attempt,  therefore,  in  this  paper,  to  bring  to 
gether  such  illustrations  of  Lowell's  life  as  a  man  of 
letters  as  we  may  have  room  for,  which  do  not  spe 
cially  connect  themselves  with  the  political  history 
of  the  times,  or  with  his  special  work  as  a  professor 
in  Harvard  College. 

In  an  earlier  chapter  I  have  already  printed  some 
of  the  pathetic  memoranda  which  show  how  modestly 
his  career  began.  Knowing  as  we  do  that,  before 
he  was  fifty  years  old,  this  man  was  to  rank  as  one 
of  the  first  poets  of  his  time,  is  it  not  pathetic  to 
find  him  writing  to  his  nearest  friend  to  ask  whether 
it  is  probable  that  three  hundred  copies  of  his  poems 
can  be  sold  ? 

It  happened,  as  also  has  appeared  in  that  chapter, 


148  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

that  it  was  the  periodical  press  which  gave  the 
means  of  physical  support  to  the  young  man  who 
was  attempting  this  venture.  In  the  same  chapter 
I  cited  what  is  the  really  funny  criticism  of  Willis, 
if  he  made  it,  —  when  he  says  that  a  man  of  genius 
may  not  be  a  good  editor.  As  it  happened,  Lowell 
devoted  much  of  his  after  life  to  the  steady  business 
of  editing  periodicals.  I  mean  by  this,  not  simply 
the  general  oversight  of  the  plan  of  the  journal 
for  which  he  was  responsible,  but  that  diligent  and 
tedious  daily  work,  whether  of  reading  manuscripts, 
of  correcting  and  improving  them,  of  correspondence 
with  writers,  and  of  hourly  intimacy  with  publishers, 
which  makes  at  once  the  drudgery  and  the  pleasure 
of  real  editorial  life.  I  observe  that  most  young 
men  and  women  who  think  they  want  to  be  "  con 
nected  with  the  press  "  suppose  that  such  a  connec 
tion  will  simply  compel  them  to  go  to  the  theatre 
every  night,  and  to  read  agreeable  novels  and  maga 
zines  all  day.  I  have  had  a  good  deal  to  do  with 
editorial  life  myself,  and  I  have  not  found  that  this 
general  impression  regarding  it  is  correct.  Certainly 
Lowell  never  "  got  round  to  it."  He  worked  with 
steadfast  diligence.  He  says  in  one  place  that  he 
worked  more  than  fifteen  hours,  on  an  average, 
every  day.  This  means  that  he  really  read  the 
manuscripts  which  he  had  in  hand,  that  he  really 
looked  over  the  range  of  the  world's  business  to  see 
what  he  wanted,  and  that  he  tried  to  engage  such 
authors  as  were  best  fitted  for  special  work  in  the 
journal  for  which  he  was  engaged.  His  acquaint 
ance  with  men  and  women  became  larger  and  larger 


LOWELL'S  EXPERIENCE  AS  AN  EDITOR        149 

as  he  did  this,  and  there  is  many  a  pretty  story  of 
the  encouragement  which  he  gave  to  young  writers 
at  the  very  beginning  of  their  career. 

Thus,  there  was  a  joke  afterwards  between  him 
and  Mr.  Aldrich.  When  Aldrich,  somewhat  tim 
idly,  sent  his  first  poem  to  the  "  Atlantic,"  Lowell 
at  once  recognized  its  worth,  and  sent  to  him  the 
most  cordial  thanks.  Many  years  after,  Aldrich 
found  himself,  in  turn,  editor  of  the  "Atlantic." 
Lowell,  then  at  the  height  of  his  reputation,  sent  a 
poem  to  the  magazine.  Aldrich  had  the  fun  to 
copy,  in  acknowledging  the  manuscript,  the  very 
note  which  Lowell  wrote  to  him,  most  kindly,  twenty 
years  before,  in  which  he  recognized  the  value  of 
his  first  contribution.  Lowell  came  round  to  the 
office  at  once,  and  told  Aldrich  that  he  had  almost 
determined  him  "  to  adopt  a  literary  career." 

As  the  reader  knows,  Lowell  edited  the  "  Pio 
neer  "  for  its  short  existence  of  three  months. 

In  the  summer  of  1846  he  agreed  to  write  once  a 
week,  in  prose  or  in  poetry,  for  the  "  Anti-Slavery 
Standard,"  the  best  of  the  anti-slavery  journals.  He 
was  called  a  corresponding  editor.  The  paper  was 
edited  by  the  masterly  hand  of  Mr.  Sidney  Gay, 
afterwards  the  editor  of  the  "  Popular  History." 

Mr.  Lawrence  Lowell,  in  his  interesting  memoir 
of  the  poet's  life,  calls  the  few  years  from  1846  to 
1850  the  most  active  and  the  most  happy  of  his  life. 
"His  happiness  was,  indeed,  broken  by  the  death 
of  little  Blanche,  in  March,  1847 ;  but  a  new  joy 
came  to  him  in  the  birth  of  another  daughter,  Rose, 
toward  the  close  of  the  year.  Both  grief  and  joy, 


150  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

however,  seem  to  have  stimulated  his  poetic  feeling, 
and  poems  such  as  '  The  First  Snowfall '  and  '  The 
Changeling '  show  the  ecstasy  to  which  they  brought 
his  nature.  During  all  this  period  he  wrote  inces 
santly,  sometimes  about  public  affairs,  sometimes 
from  a  purely  poetic  impulse,  with  no  direct  relation 
to  the  great  struggle  in  which  he  was  engaged,  but 
almost  always  with  a  stern  sense  of  his  mission  as  a 
prophet  and  a  seer.  His  character  no  less  than  his 
poetic  feeling  had  deepened  and  strengthened,  and 
•poems  like  '  The  Present  Crisis '  attest  the  full 
oiaturity  of  his  powers." 

When  Phillips  &  Sampson  established  the  "  At 
lantic  Monthly,"  in  the  autumn  of  1857,  he  was  its 
first  regular  editor;  and  there  are  some  very  nice 
letters  of  his  in  which  he  speaks  of  the  somewhat 
sudden  change  in  the  methods  of  his  daily  life  which 
come  in  as  he  walks  along  the  river-bank  from  Elm- 
wood  and  takes  the  street-car  to  the  office  in  Boston. 
If  there  were  room,  I  could  hardly  print  anything 
more  interesting  than  specimens  of  the  notes  which 
he  wrote  to  authors.  They  give  a  very  pretty  pic 
ture  of  the  watchful  interest  which  he  took  in  each 
individual  number  of  the  "  Atlantic."  It  is  as  the 
mother  of  a  large  family  might  not  let  her  children 
go  to  a  Christmas  party  without  seeing  that  the 
hands  of  each  one  were  perfectly  clean,  and  that  the 
collar  of  each  one  was  prettier  and  neater  than  the 
others'.  I  think  I  may  say  that,  in  a  somewhat 
varied  experience  in  such  matters,  I  have  known  no 
editor  who  had  so  close  a  watchful  eye  on  the  detail 
of  the  work  of  his  journal. 


JAMES   T.  FIELDS 


LOWELL'S   EXPERIENCE  AS  AN  EDITOR        151 

This  connection  with  the  "  Atlantic  "  lasted  for 
four  years,  when  James  T.  Fields,  the  prince  among 
editors,  took  his  place.  In  the  year  1863,  in  com 
pany  with  his  very  dear  friend  Mr.  Charles  Eliot  Nor 
ton,  he  became  the  editor  of  the  "  North  American 
Beview."  What  this  meant  appears  from  the  fact 
that  between  the  years  1863  and  1877  he  wrote 
thirty-four  "articles"  for  the  "North  American/' 
besides  as  many  more  of  what,  in  the  language  of 
that  day,  were  called  "critical  notices."  In  the 
"Atlantic  Monthly,"  between  the  years  1857  and 
1877,  he  wrote  one  hundred  and  sixteen  articles, 
prose  or  poetry. 

There  are,  as  I  have  intimated,  a  great  many  men 
now  prominent  among  our  men  of  letters  who  recol 
lect  Lowell  gratefully  as  being  the  Beatrice  who 
first  welcomed  them  into  this  Paradise.  Without 
attempting  to  name  half  of  them,  I  will  say  that 
Mr.  Howells,  whom  he  welcomes  so  cordially  in  a 
letter  which  is  to  be  found  in  Mr.  Norton's  collec 
tion,  and  Mr.  Aldrich,  to  whom  I  referred  just  now, 
both  afterwards  became  editors  of  the  "  Atlantic  " 
themselves.  In  their  time  they  have  passed  on  the 
welcome  which  the  prince  of  American  poets  gave 
to  both  of  them.  And  each  of  them  inherited  in 
turn  the  traditions  of  the  office,  as  he  established 
them. 

The  establishment  of  the  "  Atlantic  Monthly  "  in 
the  autumn  of  1857  proved  so  fortunate  an  era  in 
the  history  of  the  native  literature  of  America  that 
I  may  safely  give  to  it  a  few  sentences  in  these 
memorials.  Lowell's  connection  with  that  magazine 


152  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

enlarged  very  widely  the  circle  of  his  friends  and 
the  range  of  his  life. 

It  was,  then,  two  or  three  years  since  the  little 
Eden  of  Boston  bookselling  had  been  disturbed  in 
its  somnolence  to  a  sudden  "  new  departure/'  if  we 
may  borrow  an  admirable  phrase  from  the  forgotten 
times  when  we  had  a  mercantile  marine.  This  "  new 
departure  "  was  the  movement,  as  of  a  stork  among 
a  world  of  frogs,  instituted  by  Phillips  &  Sampson, 
a  new-born  firm  among  booksellers. 

The  publishing  business  in  Boston  felt  the  wave 
of  their  impetuosity.  It  can  hardly  be  said  that  the 
old  houses  waked  from  the  decorous  sleep  of  many 
years.  But  this  new  publishing  house,  with  man 
ners  and  customs  wholly  unknown  before,  suddenly 
appeared,  to  the  dumb  amazement  of  the  old  stand- 
bys,  and  to  the  delight  and  amusement  of  all  young 
America,  in  the  East. 

Boston  had  never  earned  for  itself  its  distinct 
position  as  one  of  the  publishing  centres  of  America. 
It  had  inherited  that  position  without  earning  it. 
Harvard  College,  the  Boston  Athenaeum,  the  Amer 
ican  Academy,  the  Massachusetts  Historical  Society, 
the  New  England  system  of  lectures,  and  the  great 
free  school  system,  which  gave  a  liberal  education 
to  any  boy  who  would  take  it,  —  these,  all  together, 
created  a  circle  of  authors.  They  created  the 
"  Monthly  Anthology,"  the  "  North  American  Ee- 
view,"  and  the  "Christian  Examiner."  Such  men 
as  Bancroft,  Prescott,  Hildreth,  Sparks,  the  Everetts, 
Hawthorne,  Emerson,  and  now  Lowell,  came  forward 
with  books  which  had  to  be  published.  The  loyalty 


LOWELL'S  EXPERIENCE  AS  AN  EDITOR        153 

of  the  Boston  lawyers  to  their  business,  of  the  doc 
tors  to  theirs,  and  of  the  ministers  to  theirs,  had 
made  it  necessary  that  there  should  be  printers  and 
shops  where  books  could  be  bought  and  sold.  So 
the  importers  of  English  books  had  become,  in  a 
languid  way,  the  publishers  of  books. 

But  they  did  not  want  to  publish  them.  They 
did  not  expect  to  make  money  by  publishing  them. 
They  did  not  know  anything  about  them.  Alexan 
der  Everett  used  to  say  that  a  bookseller  was  the 
only  tradesman  who  knew  nothing  about  the  wares 
he  sold.  Of  the  Boston  trade  in  those  prehistoric 
days  this  was  substantially  true.  But,  in  truth, 
there  was  not  much  publishing,  excepting  the  issue 
of  some  law  books  and  a  few  medical  books.  Hil- 
liard  &  Gray,  and  Crocker  &  Brewster,  attended  to 
these  affairs  and  cared  little  for  any  others. 

Any  one  of  the  old  firms  regarded  an  author  with 
a  manuscript  much  as  a  dealer  in  Russian  sail-cloth 
might  regard  a  lady  who  should  come  into  his  count 
ing-room  and  ask  him  to  make  her  a  linen  handker 
chief. 

All  of  a  sudden,  as  a  wave  of  water  might  sweep 
over  a  thick,  rotten  ice-floe  in  one  of  Nansen's  sum 
mers,  a  marvelous  inundation  swept  over  this  deco 
rous  imbecility.  That  is  to  say,  two  young  men 
formed  a  "  publishing  firm."  They  did  not  want 
to  import  books.  They  wanted  to  make  them  and 
to  sell  them. 

More  simply  speaking,  "  Phillips  &  Sampson " 
appeared  about  the  year  1843.  Charles  Sampson 
(a  young  man  when  he  died  in  1858)  used  to  say 


154  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

that  he  had  peddled  molasses  candy  from  a  tin 
waiter  on  holidays,  when  he  was  a  boy.  Moses 
Dresser  Phillips  had  been  brought  up  to  the  retail 
book  trade  in  Worcester,  in  the  shop  of  Clarendon 
Harris,  who  succeeded  Isaiah  Thomas,  the  publisher 
of  the  first  American  Bible.  I  do  not  know  how 
these  young  fellows  first  met  each  other.  But  it 
was  they  who  taught  the  drowsy  chiefs  of  the  little 
Boston  book-shops  the  great  lesson  that  in  a  na 
tion  which  had  taught  thirty  million  people  how  to 
read,  there  were  more  than  five  hundred  people 
who  wanted  to  read  Emerson's  essays  or  Macaulay's 
history. 

Emerson,  as  has  been  said,  had  never  received 
one  cent  from  the  publication  of  his  essays,  when 
Phillips  &  Sampson,  about  1850,  published  "  Eng 
lish  Traits"  for  him.  Mr.  Phillips  was  by  mar 
riage  connected  with  Emerson's  family,  and  had 
persuaded  him  to  leave  James  Monroe  and  give  the 
new  book  to  the  younger  firm,  now  well  established 
in  business. 

But  this  new  firm  meant  to  make  books  which 
everybody  must  buy,  and  to  sell  them  where  any 
body  could  read.  They  did  not  pretend  to  retail 
books,  any  more  than  the  Pacific  Mills  pretend  to  sell 
to  a  good  housewife  the  material  for  a  shirt  or  a  sheet. 
They  did  mean  to  make  them  and  to  sell  them  to 
the  retailers.  So  far  as  the  nation  at  large  went,  or 
a  wholesale  trade  with  dealers  anywhere,  they  had 
hardly  any  rivals  in  Boston.  Opposite  them  was 
the  shop  of  Ticknor  &  Fields.  The  young,  wide 
awake  James  T.  Fields,  now  so  well  known  by  his 


MOSES   DRESSER   PHILLIPS 


LOWELL'S  EXPERIENCE  AS  AN  EDITOR        155 

charming  reminiscences  and  other  essays,  had  en 
tered  that  shop,  as  "youngest  boy,"  in  the  later 
thirties.  His  broad  and  intelligent  foresight  was 
beginning  to  bear  fruit.  But  Allen  &  Ticknor  can 
hardly  be  numbered  among  publishers,  and  Ticknor 
&  Fields  did  not  exist  as  a  firm  until  Cummings  & 
Hilliard  had  become  Hilliard  &  Gray.  This  firm 
published  law  books  and  medical  books.  Crocker 
&  Brewster,  successors  to  Governor  Armstrong,  im 
ported  and  sold  theological  books.  I  bought  my 
Hebrew  Bible  and  my  Gesenius's  Lexicon  from 
them  in  1839.  But,  if  a  man  wanted  one  of  these 
firms  to  publish  a  book  for  him,  why,  they  would 
have  told  him  that  he  must  pay  for  his  plates  and 
his  printing.  Thus  Mr.  Bancroft,  fortunately  for 
himself,  owned  the  plates  and  the  printed  copies  of 
his  own  History  from  1833  until  he  died. 

Charles  Sampson  and  Moses  Dresser  Phillips  made 
an  admirable  combination,  and  the  early  death  of 
both  of  them  made  a  break  in  the  book  business  of 
Boston  which  it  did  not  easily  recover  from.  These 
young  men  were  not  satisfied  with  the  gilt-edged 
retail  "  trade "  of  Boston  and  Cambridge.  They 
went  far  afield  with  their  wares.  Mr.  Phillips  used 
to  tell  with  glee  the  story  of  their  first  orders  from 
San  Francisco  in  the  '49  days.  "  So  many  hundred 
packs  of  '  Highland  '  cards,  so  many  of  the  4  True 
Thomas '  cards,  and  so  on  till  the  box  was  nearly 
full,  and  then  '  one  dozen  Bibles.' ' 

This  was  seed-corn,  he  said.  And  then,  in  1852 
or  1853,  he  would  read  you  their  last  invoices, 
as  they  answered  immense  orders  from  California. 


156  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

"Four  hundred  Byron's  Poems,  four  hundred 
Scott's  Poems,  one  hundred  Cowper's  Poems/'  and 
so  on,  in  large  shipments.  And  he  would  say, 
"  That  is  the  crop  that  comes  from  the  twelve 
Bibles.  Such  editions  of  the  poets,"  he  would  say, 
"  as  you  would  not  have  seen  in  your  house,  —  but, 
after  all,  Cowper  is  Cowper,  and  Scott  is  Scott." 

Both  these  men  were  resolute  to  meet  the  people 
halfway.  Both  of  them  were  Democrats  in  parti 
san  connection,  not  because  they  believed  in  the 
heresies  of  such  men  as  Polk  and  Dallas,  but  be 
cause  they  believed  in  the  People.  There  was 
nothing  of  the  white-kid  glove,  gilt-edged  paper, 
"u  in  honour"  nonsense  about  them.  Naturally, 
such  believers  as  they  were  regarded  as  unorthodox 
in  the  trade  of  that  day. 

Their  great  onslaught  on  decorous  publishing 
was  made  when  they  printed  and  sold  Macaulay's 
History  for  fifty  cents  a  volume  at  retail. 

Such  a  firm  as  this  won  its  way  up  from  selling 
books  at  auction,  at  retail,  on  winter  evenings,  to 
publishing  large  editions  and  placing  them  every 
where  in  America.  And  when  the  fullness  of  time 
for  such  an  enterprise  came,  they  determined  to 
publish  "The  Atlantic  Monthly."  The  plan  was 
matured  in  the  autumn  of  1857.  Through  the 
kindness  of  a  friend,  I  am  able  to  reprint  here  Mr. 
Phillips' s  own  description,  at  the  time,  of  a  famous 
dinner  in  which  the  enterprise  was  first  announced 
—  I  ought  not  to  say  in  public,  for  this  was  a  pri 
vate  dinner.  But  I  may  say  that  that  dinner-party 
was  the  first  of  a  series  which  the  Saturday  Club  of 


LOWELL'S   EXPERIENCE  AS  AN  EDITOR        157 

Boston  has  held  from  that  day  to  this  day.  Mr. 
Phillips  wrote,  "  I  must  tell  you  about  a  little  dinner 
party  I  gave  about  two  weeks  ago.  It  would  be 
proper,  perhaps,  to  state  that  the  origin  of  it  was 
a  desire  to  confer  with  my  literary  friends  on  a 
somewhat  extensive  literary  project,  the  particulars 
of  which  I  shall  reserve  till  you  come.  But  to  the 
party  :  My  invitations  included  only  R.  W.  Emerson, 
H.  W.  Longfellow,  J.  R.  Lowell,  Mr.  Motley  (the 
<  Dutch  Republic '  man),  0.  W.  Holmes,  Mr.  Cabot, 
and  Mr.  Underwood,  our  literary  man.  Imagine  your 
uncle  as  the  head  of  such  a  table,  with  such  guests. 
The  above  named  were  the  only  ones  invited,  and 
they  were  all  present.  We  sat  down  at  three  P.  M., 
and  rose  at  eight.  The  time  occupied  was  longer  by 
about  four  hours  and  thirty  minutes  than  I  am  in  the 
habit  of  consuming  in  that  kind  of  occupation,  but 
it  was  the  richest  time  intellectually  by  all  odds  that 
I  have  ever  had.  Leaving  myself  and  (  literary  man  ' 
out  of  the  group,  I  think  you  will  agree  with  me  that 
it  would  be  difficult  to  duplicate  that  number  of  such 
conceded  scholarship  in  the  whole  country  beside. 

"  Mr.  Emerson  took  the  first  post  of  honor  at  my 
right,  and  Mr.  Longfellow  the  second  at  my  left. 
The  exact  arrangement  of  the  table  was  as  follows : 

Mr.  Underwood. 

Cabot.  Lowell. 

Motley.  Holmes. 

Longfellow.  Emerson. 

Phillips. 

"  They  seemed  so  well  pleased  that  they  adjourned, 
and  invited  me  to  meet  them  again  to-morrow,  when 


158  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

I  shall  again  meet  the  same  persons,  with  one  other 
(Whipple,  the  essayist)  added  to  that  brilliant  con 
stellation  of  philosophical,  poetical,  and  historical 
talent.  Each  one  is  known  alike  on  both  sides  of 
the  Atlantic,  and  is  read  beyond  the  limits  of  the 
English  language.  Though  all  this  is  known  to 
you,  you  will  pardon  me  for  intruding  it  upon  you. 
But  still  I  have  the  vanity  to  believe  that  you  will 
think  them  the  most  natural  thoughts  in  the  world 
to  me.  Though  I  say  it  that  should  not,  it  was  the 
proudest  day  of  my  life." 

In  this  letter  he  does  not  tell  of  his  own  little 
speech,  made  at  the  launch.  But  at  the  time  we 
all  knew  of  it.  He  announced  the  plan  of  the 
magazine  by  saying,  "  Mr.  Cabot  is  much  wiser  than 
I  am.  Dr.  Holmes  can  write  funnier  verses  than  I 
can.  Mr.  Motley  can  write  history  better  than  I. 
Mr.  Emerson  is  a  philosopher  and  I  am  not.  Mr. 
Lowell  knows  more  of  the  old  poets  than  I."  But 
after  this  confession  he  said,  "But  none  of  you 
knows  the  American  people  as  well  as  I  do." 

This  was  the  truth,  and  they  knew  it  was  the 
truth.  The  "Atlantic,"  at  that  moment,  asserted 
its  true  place.  It  was  not  "  The  Boston  Mis 
cellany  ;  "  it  was  the  journal  for  the  nation,  which 
at  that  time  had  no  Pacific  slope  which  needed  to 
be  named. 

Yet  I  have  guessed  that,  in  the  fact  that  "  the 
Atlantic  States  "  were  then  contributing  the  capital 
and  the  men  who  were  forming  the  Pacific  States, 
we  find  the  origin  of  the  very  fortunate  name 
of  the  magazine.  The  civilization  of  the  smaller 


OLIVER  WENDELL    HOLMES   (1862) 


LOWELL'S  EXPERIENCE  AS  AN  EDITOR        159 

Atlantic  basin  was  beginning  to  assert  itself  in  that 
great  Pacific  basin  which  implies,  when  we  speak 
of  it,  half  the  surface  of  the  world.  And  of  such  an 
assertion  the  "  Atlantic  "  was  to  be  the  mouthpiece. 
But  this  is  my  guess  only.  I  never  talked  with  him 
about  the  name,  and  I  do  not  know  who  suggested 
it.  No  man  then  thought  of  the  Philippines. 

I  always  thought  that,  at  the  beginning,  Mr. 
Phillips  meant  to  edit  the  magazine  himself.  I  do 
not  believe  that  it  occurred  to  him,  before  he  began, 
that  a  magazine  office  is  a  place  to  which  every 
prophet,  every  poet,  and  every  fool  in  the  land 
thinks  he  may  send  what  he  chooses  to  write,  and 
supposes  that  he  is  "  entitled  "  to  have  it  read,  not 
to  say  printed  and  circulated.  I  think  he  thought 
he  was  to  ask  John,  James,  and  the  others,  for 
whom  he  was  publishing  books,  to  send  articles  fit 
for  the  magazine,  as  Mr.  Prescott,  for  instance,  sent 
a  chapter  of  his  "  Charles  the  Fifth."  He  did  not 
think  that  Tom,  Dick,  or  Harry  had  any  "  rights  " 
in  the  business.  Perhaps  Mr.  Underwood  or  some 
one  in  the  office  was  to  read  the  proofs. 

But  very  soon  this  simple  Arcadian  notion  van 
ished.  And  very  soon  Lowell  was  the  working 
editor  of  the  magazine. 

Let  me  say  a  word  about  any  presumption  that 
Lowell  was  a  mere  figurehead,  and  that  some  one 
else  did  the  work.  Trust  me,  for  I  know.  I  have 
worked  under  many  editors,  good  and  bad.  Not 
one  of  them  understood  his  business  better  than 
Lowell,  or  worked  at  its  details  more  faithfully.  I 
think  he  hated  to  read  manuscripts  as  much  as  any 


160  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

man  of  sense  does.  In  those  days  there  was  practi 
cally  no  typewriting.  I  think  that,  like  any  man 
of  sense,  he  would  prefer  to  write  an  article  than  to 
read  the  average  "  contribution."  But  he  had  said 
he  would  do  it,  and  he  did  it  —  up  to  time,  so  far 
as  I  have  seen,  careful  in  detail  even  to  the  least 
detail,  and  he  had  no  reason  to  be  ashamed  of  his 
work  when  he  was  done. 

In  those  days  people  of  literary  aspirations,  espe 
cially  young  people,  read  the  English  magazines 
almost  religiously.  Indeed,  "  Blackwood "  and 
"  Frazer  "  and  sometimes  the  "  Dublin  University 
Magazine  "  were  worth  reading.  I  am  afraid  that, 
for  all  I  have  said  or  implied  about  the  American 
or  Atlantic  basis  of  the  new  magazine,  the  original 
cover  was,  in  a  way,  an  imitation  of  "  Blackwood." 
The  color  was,  as  it  is,  a  sort  of  tawny  brown.  It 
was  more  tawny  then  than  it  is  now.  Did  it  just 
suggest  the  "  tawny  lion  pawing  to  be  free  "  ?  I 
do  not  think  Phillips  thought  of  this.  Perhaps 
Holmes  and  Lowell  did.  Where  "  Blackwood's 
Magazine  "  had  and  has  a  medallion  head  of  some 
body,  we  put  on  the  cover  of  our  "  maga  "  the  head 
of  John  Winthrop,  from  the  old  portrait  said  to  be 
by  Vandyke,  —  I  do  not  know  why. 

Now  this  was  as  bad  a  mistake  as  the  New 
Yorkers  made  in  calling  their  magazine  the  "  Knick 
erbocker."  That  is,  it  gave  a  local  emblem  to  a 
national  magazine.  John  Winthrop  was  a  great 
man.  But  his  greatness  belonged  to  Massachusetts, 
and  not  to  the  nation.  West  of  the  Hudson  Kiver 
there  were  not  a  thousand  men  in  the  country  who 
knew  anything  about  him. 


LOWELL'S  EXPERIENCE  AS  AN  EDITOR        161 

But  this  mistake  was  not  held  to.  After  two 
years  the  "  Atlantic  "  had  full  reason  to  show  that 
it  stood,  not  for  Massachusetts,  but  for  "  We,  the 
People  of  the  United  States."  And  the  national 
flag  was  substituted  for  the  head  of  a  Massachusetts 
governor.  Why  it  was  taken  off,  I  never  knew ; 
I  doubt  if  any  one  else  does.  One  is  pleased  to 
see,  as  this  sheet  passes  the  press,  that  it  has  ap 
peared  again.1 

In  the  war  the  magazine  was  loyal  from  hub  to 
tire.  Some  capital  contributions  to  history  are  em 
balmed  in  it.  I  remember  the  late  Caleb  William 
Loring's  excellent  paper  on  Antietam,  a  good  com 
panion  to  Dr.  Holmes's  "  Hunt  after  the  Captain." 

It  may  be  amusing  to  preserve  one  or  two  remi 
niscences  of  the  delay  with  which  magazines  then 
appeared,  at  which  writers  meekly  complained. 

The  admirable  Theodore  Winthrop  was  killed  in  a 
miserable  outpost  skirmish  above  Hampton.  Then, 
and,  alas !  not  till  then,  the  "  Atlantic  people " 
remembered  that  they  had  some  excellent  manu 
scripts  of  his,  which  had  been  seasoning  in  the  safe, 
doubtless  paid  for  when  they  were  accepted,  but 
"  crowded  out "  till  then.  Then  they  were  pushed 
into  type  as  soon  as  might  be.  But  death  came 
before  the  "  Atlantic  "  took  the  credit,  which  it  de 
served,  of  discovering  the  author. 

I  tell  this,  with  some  venom,  because  I  myself 
suffered  a  little  from  what  Hamlet  should  have 
called  the  pangs  of  delay  of  magazine  men.  I  had 
written  for  the  Ohio  canvass  of  September,  1863,  a 

1  Alas,-  to  be  eclipsed  again  ! 


162  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

story  called  "  The  Man  without  a  Country."  It 
was  "  rushed  through,"  that  it  might  be  in  time 
to  defeat  Vallandigham  in  the  election  of  October. 
And  by  such  swiftness  of  proofs  and  revises,  unex 
ampled  before,  it  got  itself  printed  in  the  December 
number  of  the  same  year,  when  poor  Vallandigham 
had  been  well  beaten  and  forgotten ! 

Ah,  youngsters  of  1898,  how  little  do  you  know 
of  what  you  enjoy  in  these  days  of  "  quick  proofs, 
no  revises,  fast  coaches."  The  true  rule  for  an  edi 
tor  is  to  send  back  to  each  author  every  manuscript 
which  he  has  by  him,  and  to  trust  to  February  to 
fill  the  appetite  of  March.  One  does  not  care  to 
have  his  eggs  too  old. 

It  is  to  go  back  a  little  from  the  birthday  of  the 
"  Atlantic  "  to  speak  of  the  first  of  the  "  Biglow 
Papers  "  ten  years  before.  The  series  ran  for  nearly 
four  years. 

It  was  in  June,  1846,  in  face  of  the  almost  unani 
mous  hatred  of  the  Mexican  War  among  Massachu 
setts  people,  that  a  regiment  was  raised  in  Boston 
and  the  neighborhood  for  that  war.  Lowell  saw 
a  recruiting  officer  in  the  street,  and  was  roused 
to  much  the  sort  of  wrath  which  fired  the  average 
Boston  gentleman  in  1773  when  he  saw  a  "  lobster- 
back"  loafing  in  the  same  street  with  as  little  reason. 
Lowell  wrote  for  the  "  Courier  "  what  he  calls  "  a 
squib,"  which  was  the  first  of  the  "  Biglow  Papers." 
Mr.  Lawrence  Lowell  reminds  us  that  he  did  not 
follow  up  its  success  at  once.  The  third  paper  was 
published  a  year  and  a  half  after  the  first.  After 
this  the  poems  of  the  first  series  appeared  in  ramd 
succession. 


tew 


If  applied  with  a  utilitarian  vie 

.-  -  i  —  «P-       -—       —   -^— 

Suppose,  for  example,  we  shipped  it  with  caro 

To  Sahara's  great  desert  and  let  it  bore  there, 
1'1  one  short  firissiort^ticl  fjr?  jiotJui 
iill  the  whole  wasto  with  Artc.sma  wclk^ 
at  'tis  time  now  with  pen  phonographic  to  follow 

some  more  of  his  sketches  onr  laughing  ApoBo  :•— 


w 


ears 


I 


'  H? 

,,„„  J 


"  Thero  conies  Harry  Franco,  and,  as  he  draws' 
You  find  that's  a  smile  which  you  took  for  a  sneer  ; 
One  half  of  him  contradicts  t'other,  hia  wont 
Is  to  say  very  sharp  things  and  do  very  blunt ; 
His  manner  ';s  as  hard  as  his  footings  ara  tendey, 
And  a  sortie  he'll  make  when  he  means  to  surrender ; 
He's  in  joke  half  the  time  when  lie  geem.Tto  bo  stoniest, 
When  ho  seems  to  bo  joking,  bo  sura  he's  in  earnest ; 
Ho  has  common  S6U30  in  a  way  that's  uncommon, 
Hates  humbug  and  cant,  loves  his  friends  like  a  woman, 
ljuilds  bis  dislikes  of  cards  and  his  friendships  of  oak, 
Loves  a  prejudice  better  than  augbt  but  a  joke, 
Is  half  upright  Quaker,  half  dowmitrht^o;.'i.;-outcr, 
Loves  Freedom  top  well  to  go  strul:  mad  about  her,       / 
Quito  artless  himself  is  a  foyer  of  JPrt,  «^ 

Shuts  you  out  of  his  secrets  and  .into  his  heart* 
And  though  not  a  poet,  yut  all  must  ncimiro 
ill  his  letters  of  Pinto  his  skill  on  the  liar. 

"There  comes  Puc  with  his  ravcr^likc  Barnaby  I»udg«»,    ^/ 
Three- iiftlu  of  him  genius  ami  ltvu-ufilr»  sheer  \\\  ' 


A    FABLE    FOR   CRITICS"   PROOF-SHEET  WITH    LOWELL'S   CORRECTIONS 
From  the  original,  kindly  lent  by  Mrs.  Charles  F.  Briggs,  Brooklyn,  N.  Y. 


LOWELL'S  EXPERIENCE  AS  AN  EDITOR        163 

In  the  period  between  the  middle  of  1847  and 
the  end  of  1849  he  wrote  most  of  the  "Biglow 
Papers"  of  that  series,  he  continued  his  regular 
work  for  the  "Standard,"  and  wrote  the  "Fable  for 
Critics"  and  the  "Vision  of  Sir  Launfal."  Mr. 
Lawrence  Lowell  says  that  the  last  was  written  in 
forty-eight  hours,  during  which  he  scarcely  slept  or 
ate ;  and  he  considers  it  the  most  generally  popular 
of  the  poet's  longer  poems. 

Success  gave  him  new  stimulus,  and  in  a  happy 
home  he  worked  with  all  the  help  which  love  and 
true  sympathy  could  give  him.  To  enter  into  the 
spirit  of  that  life,  one  must  make  real  what  Mr. 
Lawrence  Lowell  has  so  well  expressed.  "  He  was, 
no  doubt,  to  some  extent  a  martyr  for  his  political 
opinions,  but  no  martyr  was  ever  so  high-spirited, 
so  jovial,  and  so  charming.  As  he  said  himself,  he 
was  curiously  compounded  of  two  utterly  distinct 
characters.  One  half  was  clear  mystic  and  enthu 
siast,  the  other  humorist ;  and  the  humor,  which  is 
the  best  balance-wheel  vouchsafed  to  man,  prevented 
his  remaining  narrow  or  fanatical." 

"  On  July  1,  1851,  he  embarked  on  a  sailing  ves 
sel  for  Genoa,  and  passed  most  of  the  f ollowing  year 
in  Italy.  A  great  part  of  the  year  was  spent  in 
Eome,  with  his  lifelong  friend,  William  Wetmore 
Story."  But  the  charm  of  the  earlier  years  was 
broken.  His  little  Rose  died  in  1850 ;  Walter,  his 
only  son,  died  two  years  later ;  Mrs.  Lowell's  health, 
always  delicate,  gave  way,  and  she  died  in  1853,  on 
the  27th  of  October,  after  they  had  returned  to 
America. 


164  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

His  duty  as  professor  at  Cambridge  began  in 
September,  1856.  Of  some  details  in  his  discharge 
of  this  I  have  spoken  in  another  chapter.  He  would 
refer,  sometimes,  to  a  certain  "  numbness  "  in  liter 
ary  effort  which  came  from  the  monotony  of  a 
teacher's  duties.  But,  as  Mr.  Lawrence  Lowell 
says,  when  we  remember  that  most  of  his  prose 
books  were  written  in  the  twenty  years  of  his  pro 
fessorship,  that  in  the  same  time  he  wrote  "  The 
Cathedral/7  the  second  series  of  the  "Biglow  Pa 
pers,"  the  great  "  Commemoration  Ode,"  and  sev 
eral  of  his  best  shorter  poems,  we  feel  that  we  must 
not  take  too  seriously  what  he  said  of  the  numbing 
effect  of  the  class-room. 

Of  "  The  Cathedral,"  after  nearly  thirty  years,  I 
may  perhaps  mention  a  contemporary  criticism. 
When  it  was  published,  I  was  the  editor  of  "  Old 
and  New."  My  theory  was,  and  is,  that  generally 
a  book  should  be  reviewed  by  some  one  in  sympathy 
with  the  author.  So  I  sent  "  The  Cathedral "  to 
Mr.  Waldo  Emerson,  hoping  that  he  would  write  a 
review  of  it  for  our  magazine.  He  returned  the 
book  the  next  day,  saying  that  he  could  not  write 
the  article.  When  I  met  him  next,  I  expressed 
my  regret ;  and  the  philosopher  said  simply,  "  But, 
I  like  Lowell,  I  like  Lowell."  To  which  I  re 
plied,  "  Yes,  and  you  like  the  poem,  do  you  not  ?  " 
"  I  like  it  —  yes ;  but  I  think  he  had  to  pump." 
The  figure  is  best  understood  by  those  of  us  who 
know  the  difference  between  "  striking  oil "  and  dig 
ging  an  artesian  well  for  it  and  putting  in  valves 
and  pistons  with  a  steam-engine.  Probably  Lowell 


WILLIAM   WETMORE   STORY 


would  have  enjoyed  the  critamm  as  much  as  any 
one. 

Lowell's  own  inside  raw  of  editing,  and  of  the 
"  Atlantic,"  the  early  career  of  which  he  directed, 
peeps  out  again  and  again  in  his  letters.  If  it 
well  to  print  here  some  of  his  private  notes  to 
tributors.  they  would,  as  I  have 
almost  motherly  care  of  the  new-born 
The  first  number  is  dated  November,  1857,  and  in 
that  month  he  writes,  "  Even  the  Magazine  has  its 
compensations."  Let  the  reader  remember  that  the 
new  duty  he  has  undertaken,  die  ••avocation.''  is 
superimposed  on  his  "vocation."  —  the  regular  work 
of  a  full  college  professor.  «Krst>  it 
got  me  out  of  debt,  and.  next,  it 
morning  walks  to  the  printing-office.  [This  was 
the  Riverside  Press,  not  far  from  the  college.] 
There  is  a  little  foot-path  which  leads  along  the 
river-bank,  and  it  is  lovely,  whether  in  clou,  cold 
mornings,  when  the  fine  filaments  of  the  hue  trees 
on  the  horizon  seem  floating  up  Eke  sea-mosses  in 
the  ether  sea,  or  when  (as  yesterday)  a  gray  mist 
fills  our  Cambridge  cup,  and  gives  a  doubtful  loom 
to  its  snowy  brim  of  nflls,  while  the  sflent  gulls 
wheel  over  the  nestling  cakes  of  ice  which  the 
Charles  is  whirling  seaward." 

If  other  editors  had  a  morning  walk  like  this,  and 
had  the  eyes  to  see  and  the  ears  to  hear,  it  might 
be  wefl  for  other  reade: 

When  one  remembers  that  the  Autocrat's  papas 
were  going  on  in  the  "Atlantic"  at  this  time,  that 
Motley  and  Prescott  were  publishing  hits  of  their 


166  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

histories  in  it,  that  Longfellow  wrote  almost  regu 
larly  in  these  numbers,  and  that  younger  writers, 
now  well  known,  were  winning  their  spurs  in  these 
first  two  volumes,  it  is  easy  to  see  that  the  work 
of  the  editor,  who  was  easily  chief  among  them, 
was  interesting  and  inspiring  to  him.  People  were 
not  then  used  to  such  papers  as  his  on  Choate 
and  Gushing.  He  writes  this  scrap  in  October, 
1858 :  - 

"  Phillips  was  so  persuaded  of  the  stand  given  to 
the  Magazine  by  the  Choate  article  that  he  has  been 
at  me  ever  since  for  another.  So  I  have  been  writ 
ing  a  still  longer  one  on  Gushing.  I  think  you  will 
like  it,  —  though  on  looking  over  the  Choate  article 
I  am  inclined  to  think  that,  on  the  whole,  the  better 
of  the  two. 

"  The  worst  [of  editing]  is  that  it  leads  me  to 
bore  my  friends  when  I  do  get  at  them.  To  be  an 
editor  is  almost  as  bad  as  being  President." 

To  Mr.  Higginson,  then  forty  years  younger 
than  he  is  now,  he  says,  "  As  for  your  own  con 
tributions,  I  may  say  to  you,  as  I  always  have  to 
Mr.  Underwood,  that  they  are  just  to  my  liking,  — 
scholarly,  picturesque,  and,  above  all,  earnest,  —  I 
think  the  most  telling  essays  we  have  printed." 

And  when  he  resigns  the  charge  to  his  friend 
Fields — his  warm  friend  till  death — in  May,  1861: 
"  I  was  going  to  say  I  was  glad  to  be  rid  of  my  old 
man  of  the  sea.  But  I  don't  believe  I  am.  A  bore 
that  is  periodical  gets  a  friendly  face  at  last,  and 
we  miss  it  on  the  whole.  .  .  . 

"  Well,  good-by  —  delusive  royalty  !     I  abdicate 


LOWELL'S  EXPERIENCE  AS  AN  EDITOR        167 

with  what  grace  I  may.     I  lay  aside  my  paper  crown 
and  feather  sceptre." 

And  in  the  same  note  he  says  he  shall  always 
gladly  do  what  he  can  for  the  "  Atlantic/'  a  promise 
which  he  well  fulfilled.  The  second  series  of  the 
"  Biglow  Papers  "  was  published  there. 

In  a  way,  perhaps,  he  had  a  right  to  feel  that  he, 
earlier  than  any  one  else,  had  the  credit  for  the  first 
fortunes  of  the  "Atlantic,"  and  to  be  proud  of 
them.  To  become  the  editor  of  the  aged  "  North 
American,"  hand  in  hand  with  his  near  friend  Mr. 
Norton,  was  a  wholly  different  thing. 

I  am  sure  that  there  is  somewhere,  among  his 
by-letters,  an  outburst  as  to  what  he  will  do  "  if 
he  shall  ever  edit  the  '  North  American.' '  I  think 
most  youngsters  of  his  time  —  who  were  born  with 
a  pen  in  hand  —  indulged  in  the  same  dream,  if 
they  were  bred  within  sound  of  the  college  bell  at 
Cambridge. 

In  those  prehistoric  days  the  "  North  American," 
to  the  notions  of  the  few  hundred  people  who  had 
ever  heard  of  it,  was  wholly  different  from  what  any 
journal  is  now  to  any  reader.  Four  times  a  year 
only  —  quarterly  !  —  think  of  that,  young  contribu 
tors  to  to-day's  "Atlantic"  who  can  hardly  live  three 
weeks,  to  know  if  that  horrid  man  has  refused  your 
poem,  or  if  that  charming  and  sensible  editor  has 
printed  it !  Read  Mrs.  Lyman's  Life,  or  any  other 
good  sketch  of  New  England  life  in  the  twenties  of 
this  century,  and  see  how  people  wrote  or  spoke  of 
the  arrival  of  the  new  "  North  American,"  with  the 


168  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

interest  with  which  the  inhabitants  of  Saturn  might 
speak  of  the  regular  decennial  fall  of  some  well- 
timed  aerolite ! 

The  "  North  American  "  is  now  so  different  from 
what  it  was  in  1864,  when  Lowell  took  charge  of  it 
with  Mr.  Norton,  that  its  accomplished  editor  will 
pardon  me  if  I  say  ten  words  more  about  its  infant 
issues,  to  the  young  writers  of  this  generation.  It 
was  founded  —  modestly,  yes,  but  with  determina 
tion  —  among  a  little  confident  circle  of  the  well- 
trained  young  men  of  Boston,  at  a  moment  when 
Boston  counted,  perhaps,  fifty  thousand  people. 
These  were  people  who  had  time  to  read,  and  time 
to  write,  and  thought  themselves,  strange  to  say, 
the  rivals  and  equals  of  anybody  in  the  world. 
The  quarterly  was  the  then  regnant  fashion.  The 
Edinburgh  "  Quarterly,"  the  London  "  Quarterly," 
were  the  arrogant  dictators  of  English  literature. 
"  Go  to,  now !  We  will  dictate  also  !  We  will 
have  a  '  Quarterly  '  of  our  own !  "  For  one,  I  like 
what  the  vernacular  calls  the  "  dander "  of  that 
determination. 

And  some  plucky  and  loyal  bits  of  good  Ameri 
can  sentiment  and  statement  got  themselves  into  the 
juvenile  "North  American."  But  it  was  awfully 
proper.  Its  editors  were  more  anxious  about  making 
their  "  Quarterly "  respectable  in  the  eyes  of  their 
ten  English  readers  than  of  the  thousand  American 
readers,  more  or  less,  who  paid  them  five  dollars  a 
year  for  their  editing. 

Now  the  remainder  of  the  people  of  England  and 
of  the  people  of  America  did  not  know  that  any 


LOWELL'S  EXPERIENCE    AS  AN  EDITOR        169 

such  "Quarterly"  existed.  There  had  never  risen 
for  it  any  publisher  who  "knew  the  American 
people." 

In  one  of  the  changes  of  literary  "  property,"  the 
dwindling  "  list  "  of  the  now  venerable  Keview  fell 
into  the  hands  of  people  who  had  courage  to  give 
Norton  and  Lowell  the  charge  of  it.  Soon  after. 
Fields,  Osgood  &  Co.  bought  the  Review. 

"  Norton  and  I  have  undertaken  to  edit  the 
'  North  American,' '  Lowell  writes.  "  A  rather 
Sisyphean  job,  you  will  say.  It  wanted  three  chief 
elements  to  be  successful.  It  was  n't  thoroughly, 
that  is,  thick  and  thinly,  loyal;  it  wasn't  lively; 
and  it  had  no  particular  opinions  on  any  particu 
lar  subject.  It  was  an  eminently  safe  periodical, 
and  accordingly  was  in  great  danger  of  running 
aground." 

To  this  "  eminently  safe"  journal  Mr.  Norton  and 
Lowell  undertook  to  give  loyalty  and  life.  To  the 
little  circle  which  followed  in  the  steps,  now  falter 
ing,  of  the  Mutual  Admiration  Club,  they  added 
contributors  from  all  latitudes  and  longitudes. 
Thus  the  new  departure  is  marked  by  letters  asking 
for  articles,  —  to  Motley  in  Vienna,  Howells  in 
Venice,  Stedman,  who  was  a  new  writer  for  them  ; 
and,  as  the  reader  has  seen,  Lowell's  own  work  was 
in  amount  what  one  would  hardly  have  wished  for 
had  the  Review  furnished  his  only  occupation. 


CHAPTER  XI 

POLITICS    AND    THE   WAR 

IN  1856,  the  year  when  Lowell's  name  first  ap 
pears  as  a  professor  in  the  Harvard  catalogue,  he  is 
one  of  eleven  professors.  In  1891,  the  year  of  his 
death,  there  were  fifty-seven  professors  and  assistant 
professors.  The  number  of  "  tutors  "  and  "  instruc 
tors,"  to  follow  the  college  titles,  increases  in  the 
same  proportion.  Lowell's  name  does  not  appear 
on  the  list  of  the  "  Faculty  "  in  1855, 1  suppose  be 
cause  he  was  in  Europe.  The  Faculty  consisted  of 
thirteen  gentlemen,  of  whom  President  Eliot,  then 
one  of  the  junior  members,  and  Professor  James 
Mills  Peirce  are  now  the  only  survivors.  Of  his 
associates  in  the  Faculty,  Dr.  Walker  and  Professors 
Felton,  Peirce,  Bowen,  and  Levering  had  been  his 
teachers  when  he  was  himself  an  undergraduate 
twenty  years  before.  Of  the  others,  Professor  So 
phocles,  older  than  he,  had  been  Greek  professor  in 
Amherst  before  Lowell  was  at  Cambridge.  Profes 
sors  Child,  Lane,  Jennison,  Cooke,  Chase,  Eliot,  and 
James  Peirce  were  his  juniors.  In  the  cordial  and 
simple  courtesies  of  Cambridge  life,  all  these  gen 
tlemen  are  to  be  spoken  of  in  any  calendar  of  his 
friends.  After  his  college  work  begins,  his  name 
appears  on  the  list  of  the  Faculty.  And  it  remains  on 


POLITICS  AND  THE  WAR  171 

the  catalogue  during  the  eight  years  when  he  was  in 
Spain  and  England  as  American  minister.  He  went 
to  Europe  in  1855,  after  his  appointment  as  profes 
sor,  and  remained  there  more  than  a  year ;  he  made 
another  visit  in  August,  1872,  and  remained  abroad 
until  July,  1874.  His  proper  duties  at  Cambridge, 
therefore,  were  between  September,  1856,  and  the 
summer  of  1872,  and  from  October,  1874,  to  his 
appointment  as  minister  to  Spain  in  the  spring 
of  1877,  covering  in  both  periods  nearly  nineteen 
years. 

The  earlier  of  these  periods  —  that  from  1856  to 
1872  —  includes  the  whole  civil  war  and  the  most 
acute  of  the  struggles  which  preceded  it.  He  watched 
with  great  interest  the  Kansas  trials,  and  had  at  one 
time  the  idea  of  taking  Hosea  Biglow  out  to  Kansas 
to  send  his  prophecies  from  what  was  really  the  seat 
of  war.  He  was  himself  learning,  and  the  world 
was  learning,  that  Minerva  was  not  unwilling  when 
he  wrote  prose  ;  although  it  was  as  late  as  1846 
that  he  expressed  himself  so  doubtfully  in  that  mat 
ter.  It  is  a  pity  that  the  best  of  his  political  essays, 
in  the  "  Standard,"  in  the  "  Atlantic,"  and  in  the 
"  North  American,"  cannot  be  published  together 
in  a  volume  for  popular  circulation.  In  one  volume 
of  the  Riverside  edition  of  his  collected  works  are 
four  of  the  best.  If  these  were  in  a  separate  vol 
ume,  and  a  few  more  of  the  same  sort  were  printed 
with  them,  it  would  be  good  reading  for  the  New 
Stuarts,  for  Philistines,  Pharisees,  and  Lynch-men. 
It  will  be  many  years,  I  fear,  before  we  are  done 
with  them. 


172  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

His  cousin,  Mr.  Lawrence  Lowell,  thus  character 
izes  these  essays  :  — 

"  During  the  period  of  war  and  reconstruction 
Lowell  wrote  a  number  of  political  essays,  but  these 
are  not  as  remarkable  as  his  poetry  or  his  criticism. 
Although  very  influential  in  forming  public  opinion, 
and  although  containing  many  wise  sayings  and 
many  striking  aphorisms  on  government,  they  are, 
in  the  main,  a  forcible  exposition  of  the  opinions 
held  by  intelligent  Republicans.  Beginning  with  a 
distrust  of  Lincoln's  tentative  policy,  they  finally 
express  unbounded  admiration  for  the  statesmanship 
that  could  wait  until  the  times  were  ripe,  and  give 
the  lead  when  the  people  were  ready  to  follow.  The 
essays  show  how  thoroughly  the  writer  had  become 
estranged  from  the  abolitionists.  He  regards  the 
conflict  at  the  outset,  not  as  a  crusade  against  sla 
very,  but  as  a  struggle  to  restore  order  and  main 
tain  the  unity  of  the  nation  as  a  question  of  na 
tional  existence,  in  which  the  peculiar  institution  of 
the  South  is  not  at  issue  ;  and,  although  before  the 
war  was  over  he  saw  that  no  lasting  peace  was 
possible  unless  slavery  was  forever  destroyed,  he 
held  that  opinion  in  common  with  men  who  had 
never  harbored  a  thought  of  abolition  before  the 
secession  of  South  Carolina.  In  short,  he  no  longer 
writes  as  the  prophet  of  1848,  but  as  a  citizen  and 
a  statesman." 

In  an  earlier  chapter  I  have  already  referred  to 
the  "  Anti-Slavery  Standard/'  so  long  a  brilliant 
exception  to  the  dullness,  almost  proverbial,  of  what 
are  called  the  "  organs  "  of  causes  or  of  societies. 


POLITICS  AXD  THE  WAR  173 

Lowell's  connection  with  the  "  Standard  "  for  many 
years  brought  him  into  close  connection  with  a  man 
after  his  own  heart,  Sydney  Howard  Gay,  well 
known  among  all  journalists,  historians,  and  men  of 
letters  in  America.  He  will  be  remembered  for  the 
untold  services  which  he  rendered  to  the  country  in 
and  after  the  civil  war,  and  to  good  letters,  good 
history,  and  good  journalism,  before  the  war,  in  the 
war,  after  the  war,  and,  indeed,  as  long  as  he  lived. 

In  1840  it  would  have  been  difficult,  even  for  a 
person  inside  the  sacred  circle  of  the  abolitionists, 
to  explain,  in  a  manner  satisfactory  to  every  one, 
the  difference  between  "  old  organization,"  "  new 
organization,"  and  the  shades  of  feeling  and  thought 
in  either,  or  among  "  conie-outers "  or  "  come- 
outer  "  societies,  which  were  neither  of  the  new  nor 
old.  For  an  outsider  it  would  have  been  impossible 
to  make  such  explanations  then.  And,  fortunately, 
any  such  discrimination  is  now  as  unnecessary  as  it 
is  impossible.  They  were  ah1  free  lances,  who  obeyed 
any  leader  when  they  chose,  and,  if  they  did  not 
like  his  direction,  told  him  so  and  refused  to  follow. 
A  sufficient  section  of  anti-slavery  people,  however, 
to  carry  out  their  purposes,  established  the  "  Anti- 
Slavery  Standard." 

At  a  meeting  quite  celebrated  in  those  times, 
in  which  the  original  Anti-Slavery  Society  divided 
itself  between  what  was  called  the  "  old  organiza 
tion  "  and  the  "  new  organization,"  the  old  organ 
ization,  sometimes  called  the  "  Garrisoniaus,"  deter 
mined  to  establish  this  paper.  This  was  in  the  year 
1S40,  and  the  first  editor  was  a  gentleman  named 


174  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

Nathaniel  P.  Rogers,  a  brilliant  and  vigorous  writer 
from  New  Hampshire.  He  died  in  1846.  His 
essays  have  been  published,  with  a  Life  by  John 
Pierpont. 

The  motto  of  the  new  journal  was  "  Without 
concealment  and  without  compromise."  It  was 
under  the  general  superintendence  of  what  is  spoken 
of  afterwards  as  the  "  executive  committee ; "  and, 
if  I  understand  it  rightly,  this  executive  committee 
was  chosen  annually  at  the  meetings  of  the  "  old 
organization."  An  outsider,  perhaps,  would  have 
said  that  Garrison's  "  Liberator  "  would  answer  the 
purpose  of  an  organ ;  and,  so  far  as  devotion  to 
the  main  cause  went,  of  course  it  would.  But  Gar 
rison,  on  his  part,  would  never  have  ground  the  crank 
of  anybody's  organ.  And,  on  the  other  side,  the 
Anti-Slavery  Society  did  not  want,  as  such,  to  ac 
company  him  on  such  side-crusades  as  he  might 
wish  to  undertake  in  the  course  of  the  great  enter 
prise.  For  an  instance,  most,  if  not  all,  of  the  peo 
ple  who  united  to  establish  the  "  Standard  "  would 
choose  to  vote,  if  they  wanted  to  do  so,  and  fre 
quently  did  vote.  But  he  whom  in  those  days  men 
called  an  abolitionist  pure  and  simple,  whom  one 
could  underwrite  as  A  1,  would  have  abominated 
any  vote  at  any  election. 

This  was  the  explanation  given  me  by  the  person 
best  qualified  to  answer  my  question  when  I  asked, 
"  Why  the  '  National  Anti-Slavery  Standard  '  and 
the  <  Liberator '  ?  " 

In  1844  Mr.  Gay  became  the  editor  of  the  "  Stan 
dard."  He  was  an  abolitionist  through  and  through. 


POLITICS   AND  THE  WAR  175 

He  even  gave  up  the  study  of  law,  because  he  felt 
that  he  could  not  swear  to  sustain  the  Constitution 
of  the  United  States,  and  so  could  not  enter  at  the 
bar.  He  had  very  rare  gifts  of  editorial  promptness 
and  sagacity  ;  and,  as  the  "  Standard  "  itself  shows, 
had  the  unselfishness  and  the  knowledge  of  men 
which  enabled  him  to  engage  as  fellow-workmen  men 
and  women  of  remarkable  ability.  Henry  Wilson 
speaks  of  him  as  the  man  who  deserved  well  of  his 
country  because  he  kept  the  "  Tribune  "  a  war  paper 
in  spite  of  Greeley. 

Lowell  had  written  before  1846  for  the  anti-sla 
very  papers,  as  the  reader  knows.  Mrs.  Chapman, 
a  lady  distinguished  among  the  abolitionists,  had 
suggested  to  Gay  that  Lowell  would  give  strength 
to  the  "  Standard."  How  droll  it  seems  now  that 
anybody  should  be  advising  anybody  to  engage 
his  services !  Ah1  the  same,  Mrs.  Chapman  did, 
and  he  was  retained  to  write  once  a  week  for  the 
"  Standard."  In  an  early  letter  of  his  to  Gay,  as 
early  as  June  of  1846,  he  says  that  he  is  "  totally 
unfitted  "  for  the  position  of  an  "  editorial  contribu 
tor."  He  was  sure  that  Garrison  and  Mrs.  Chapman 
overrated  his  popularity.  "  In  the  next  place,"  — 
this  is  edifying  now,  —  "  if  I  have  any  vocation,  it 
is  the  making  of  verse.  When  I  take  my  pen  for 
that,  the  world  opens  itself  ungrudgingly  before  me, 
everything  seems  clear  and  easy,  as  it  seems  sinking 
to  the  bottom  would  be  as  one  leans  over  the  edge 
of  his  boat  in  one  of  those  dear  coves  at  Fresh  Pond. 
But  when  I  do  prose,  it  is  invitti  Miner v&.  My  true 
place  is  to  serve  the  cause  as  a  poet." 


r/(j  ,JAMI,:.  JM,  :,:,!•,!,  i, 

In  the  ii.-i.HM-.  le.th  i  IM-  ii"<"  I  .  wli.'if,  we  now  rail  a 
"  Funny  column.  "  |fo  rail:.  it  a  "  WeeUy  l';i  ,'jml  " 
"  I  ;iin  -.UK'  I  corn*  ae»o';M  enough  comical  thought  , 
in  ;i  .'•!  l.o  in;i.J'.<:  nj>  a,  f'ood  iihare  of  inch  ;.  corner, 
and  r.ii;';-.  ;HM|  yournelF  |  ^;iy  |  ;i.u<l  f^innc  y 


fx-r^in    in    llx  l;mol;ud       tli;it 

l'   lc!l«  t   ,   :,i;'i.c'l    '-'-    liylni,"    wliicJi    V/illi    infinite 

I  'in    and    Hpinl/    nivitulfjd     Hoi.fon    l<>    tint    dccorou  . 
'ii.'      ol    llio.c   people   wlio    !I;M!    uippo  .<  'I    lint,    l.ln«y 

won?  ilio  "  upp^r  lour  imndnxl."  TIM-  ldl<  r,  //<  « 
al'lcrwanl  curi'M-o!  on  in  UMJ  "  TrihuiKj"  For  ni;i.ny 
VCtU'H.  In  lln.  in  .l.incc,  ;ia  in  UM-  l,r;i,niilcr  ol  Mr. 
Oliy'w  w.t'VH'f'i:  to  IJio  "  TrihinM1,"  1,1  M-.  "  ,SL'i,no!;i,ro!  " 
lcj|  l,li(i  w;i,y  for  noun;  of  ilio  m;'ii;il  a(;lii(;V()nM!nl/H  in 

I.|M-   mien  •  ,1  in;-    In,  lory   of  |,li;i,l,   paper 

LowclTfi  corn'f'.ponoY.nre  willi  Ci;i.y  i.  «  «  (  Ih  nl, 
n  •:i«lin"  For  yonn^  rrM'ii  who  h;i,v(;  Fallen  in  love  wil.li 
ilmir  own  pi*  IIIM  oF  lonrnaliHni,  JMM!  .IM  l.i  ,cni,'il-c<l 
by  fJic;  cJiartn  ol  l,li;i.t<  pulm*-.  'I  o  n  ,.  »<;i<lin"  ;ill,cr 
fil'l.y  y»Mifi,  il,  IH  odiiyin^r,  uol,  l-o  f,;iy  amn:,in^,  io 
find  l-lial,,  al'inr  ral.lM-.r  monr  l,li;m  ;i,  y«-;i.r,  l.lio  "  Kxc*  n 
l,ivc  (/omniif/lc<i  "  of  ilio  "  Sf/andard  *'  Fjr.'in-o1  l.li;i.l, 
they  were  llinj'in^  l.lieir  money  away  in  paying  UIIH 
yonn;'  |»oel,  lour1  <loll;u;i  ;in<l  ei«»|ity  eenl.'i  ;i  week  For 
In  .  eonf  i  ilnil  ,101111.  'I  lunl  »»l  lli;il,  ^'enl/lcrnen  who 
rn.in;i;M-  I,  he  In.i  inn  ,  of  WfMtklyor  monthly  joiirtmlH 
IMIW  !  .l.unen  Low<-ll,  in  the  v<-ry  prinM-  of  IHH  lifn, 
i:.  wnlni"  lor  you.  lie  i,  |ii  ,1  l)C"innin"  on  I,  ho 
tc  lie-low  I'ap^iH."  And  you  find  lh.il  I  he  work  i;t 
not  worth  live  dollani  a  weeh,  and  notify  your  work- 
in;'  editor  that  he.  inic.t  he  di'Ojjped  ! 


AM>  'nn;   WAI  IYY 

J/OW'-ir  .    I'-.tf.'T     in     n-.ply    r.    rn.'inly    ;in']     r,Olirf,f;OU.;; 
lie.  even    •..»•/•.   lh;.f.   he.    ha,    f<-|t     .orrM-.whaf.    r:rarn|»<:d    hy 
thf,  k no vvl'-'l'' '•  t,h;j.t,  ;».  ^onc.spondinf/    <-.dit,oi   ou"ht.  to 
n;co;'ni/<:    fh<:   vM-.y/-.    of    ;)ii  ''•  I't'/.f.r.ulivt:  f'ominiU.f.r 
"|    h,;v:   Ml,  |,}j;j,i   I    r^jf/ljt,    f.'i    worl<     in     rn  y  r>wn    way, 
;,nd    y  I.    I    ii:.  vc.    ;j|  ,o    f  r  1 1,    t}].;t.    I    ou;'l,f    f'>   f.r  y    t',    <//<>»  l< 
in     tln-ir    way,  KO    t.}j;U.    i     fj;j,V(;    l-Jil'.'i    <>i     v/oihn;'     in 


7<,ini"  author,  may  n-.ad  wif.h  mf'-r'  .f.  th'-  ,<•.  word  .., 
—  not  too  proud:  "I  think  tin-.  h/<-' ut,r/<-.  Commit 
t'c  y/ould  h.i  /'-.  found  if,  hard  to  ;"  I.  ,om'.  t,wo  or 
t.hr''-  of  tj)(  p',<  r;r,  I  h.)  .-/<-.  fuini.hf.d  from  an  y  otlxr 
QQiftil  "  "I>'.i/'-r  I'>rool<,"  for  infitanr*:,  'To 
Laniartirif:,"  or  w;v*;ral  of  th<-.  r-.arly  liif'Jov/  |»:ip< 

•>uld   h'-.  h:i  i  d    f  o  ;"  t    t.h'-.m    f  ur  fii  ,h<  'I    "  f  i  orn 
any  ot.hw  fjuartf-i  "      And  f  h<-  -iriorjymou  .  r,   <  '  ut.iv^i 

r;f;nt  .  whir  h  harl  to  h<-.  paid  for  ua<  h  of  th< ••.«-.  '  VVitfi 
Oh*1.  ;nid  -'iriolh'-.r  f.urh  ja.j',  ho  •//<•  yr-r  .  t,h(:  oonnwrtlOfl 
lx;tw*;<;fi  Low<-,ll  arid  th'-.  "Standard  lasted,  HI  o/jo 
oj  anoth^J  form,  for  four  or  fi  /<  y  .n 

I    hop«-.   it  )  I  not.    too    hit.<-.    for    IJH    J'.t.ill    t.o    ' 
full  mr-.moir  of    Mr.  Gay'n  hi'    nn<\    work        A  .  ;i   p« •; 
rn;>  ri'-ii  t.     fOntnhutlOfl      t.o     h  f '•: .)  t  ur '•/     ''    I  \H;     lopular 
Hi. tor  y   ol    A  rn'-r  if.:i.  "    v/dl    p/<-. <•;'/'•,    hi.   rn'-.rnor  y          It, 
i.    t.hc     fir    t.    f,}     t.hc.    rornpo.it'-     In. tori'    .     wroir'Jit     hy 
t !,(-.    fi;i.urj  .   of    man  y  f-.x  [)'-,i  t.  ,  ;    hut.    if.   all   wc,nl    unrjf;j 
flin    f-'iK-.ful     .up'-ryi    lOfi     and     our'ht.    to     h<      railed     f>y 
hi  ,  n  mi«;,       Ai,  Chi';.;  r'o   k,  in    th<:  S£  Tri 

hun«-.,"    :nid    ;i •-.    f-o;jd|utor    with    Mr.    Bryant,    in     fix- 
;'   {'>-/'  i, n,;'     I'o.1,  "    offi''',    h<:    f-.}iOW«:d     whut    llJH    ^r«-.at. 
:;>ha/;jt, y  a.-,  an   (-.dif.or  WtlH. 


178  .1AMK8    KV88KLL  LOWELL 

1  have  never  seen  in  print  his  story  of  that  fear 
ful  night  when  Lincoln  was  killed.  But  one  hoars 
it  freely  repeated  in  conversation,  ami  I  see  no 
reason  \vhy  it  should  not  he  printed  now. 

With  the  news  of  the  murder  of  Lincoln,  there 
came  to  New  York  every  other  terrible  message. 
The  ofliee  of  the  "  Tribune,"  of  course,  received 
echoes  from  all  the  dispatches  which  showed  the 
alarm  at  Washington.  There  were  orders  for  the  ar 
rest  of  this  man,  there  were  suspicions  of  the  loyalty 
of  that  man.  No  one  knew  what  the  morrow  might 
bring. 

In  the  midst  of  the  anxieties  of  such  hours,  to 
Mr.  Cay,  the  acting  editor  of  that  paper,  there 
entered  the  foreman  of  the  typesetting-room.  Ho 
brought  with  him  the  proof  of  Mr.  Creeley's  lead- 
in*;-  article,  as  lie  had  left  it  before  leaving  the  city 
for  the  day.  It  was  a  brutal,  bitter,  sarcastic',  per 
sonal  attack  on  President  Lincoln, — the  man  who, 
when  Cay  read  the  article,  was  dving  in  Washington. 

Cav  read  the  article,  and  asked  the  foreman  if  he 
had  any  private  place  where  he  could  lock  up  the 
type,  to  which  no  one  but  himself  had  access.  'The 
foreman  said  he  had.  Cay  bade  him  tie  up  the  type, 
lock  the  galley  with  this  article  in  his  cupboard, 
and  tell  no  one  what  he  had  told  him.  Of  course 
no  such  article  appeared  in  the  "Tribune"  the  next 
morning. 

But  when  Cay  arrived  on  the  next  day  at  the 
oftiee,  he  was  met  with  the  news  that  "the  old  man" 
wanted  him,  and  the  intimation  that  "the  old  man  " 
was  very  angrv.  Cav  waited  upon  Creeley. 


SVPM  V     HiUYARn    GA\ 


POLITICS  AND  THE  WAR  179 

"  Are  you  there,  Mr.  Gay  ?  I  have  been  looking 
for  you.  They  tell  me  that  you  ordered  my  leader 
out  of  this  morning's  paper.  Is  it  your  paper  or 
mine  ?  I  should  like  to  know  if  I  cannot  print  what 
I  choose  in  my  own  newspaper ! "  This  in  great 
rage. 

"The  paper  is  yours,  Mr.  Greeley.  The  article 
is  in  type  upstairs,  and  you  can  use  it  when  you 
choose.  Only  this,  Mr.  Greeley :  I  know  New  York, 
and  I  hope  and  believe,  before  God,  that  there  is 
so  much  virtue  in  New  York  that,  if  I  had  let  that 
article  go  into  this  morning's  paper,  there  would  not 
be  one  brick  upon  another  in  the  '  Tribune '  office 
now.  Certainly  I  should  be  sorry  if  there  were." 

Mr.  Greeley  was  cowed.  He  said  not  a  word, 
nor  ever  alluded  to  the  subject  again.  I  suppose 
the  type  is  locked  up  in  the  cupboard  of  the  "  Tri 
bune  "  office  at  this  hour. 

It  was  by  this  sort  of  service  that  Mr.  Gay  earned 
Mr.  Wilson's  praise  that  "  he  kept  Mr.  Greeley  up 
to  the  war." 

Mr.  Lowell's  correspondence  with  Mr.  Gay  makes 
one  wish  that  we  had  Mr.  Gay's  side  as  well.  The 
letters  which  are  printed  in  Lowell's  correspond 
ence  are  well  worthy  the  study  of  young  journal 
ists. 

It  will  be  readily  seen  that  here  was  a  college  pro 
fessor  well  in  touch  with  the  responsibilities  of  the 
time.  Writing  occasionally  for  such  a  paper  as  the 
"  Standard,"  responsible  for  the  tone  and  politics 
of  the  "  Atlantic,"  and  afterwards  of  the  "  North 
American,"  he  could  tell  the  world  what  he  thought 


180  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL  1 

in  those  times  of  storm  and  earthquake ;  and  he  did 
not  fail  to  use  his  opportunity.  Meanwhile  the  war 
was  drawing  nearer  and  nearer.  Strictly  speaking, 
the  war  began  when  Franklin  Pierce,  on  the  part 
of  the  government  of  the  United  States,  acting  by 
the  United  States  marshal,  took  possession  of  the 
Hotel  of  the  Emigrant  Aid  Company,  in  Lawrence, 
Kansas,  in  May,  1856,  and  destroyed  it. 

The  class  of  youngsters  who  entered  Harvard 
College  in  1856,  when  Lowell  began  his  work  there, 
graduated  in  1860,  and  were  eager  to  go  into  the 
army.  Of  that  class  sixty-four  enlisted,  of  whom 
thirteen  were  killed.  Thirty-six  of  the  next  class 
enlisted  in  the  army  or  navy;  thirty  of  the  next 
class ;  and  thirty-two  of  the  class  of  1863.  Lowell 
was  in  personal  relations  with  most  of  these  young 
men.  He  had  five  young  relatives  who  died  in  the 
service,  —  General  Charles  Russell  Lowell  and  his 
brother  James  Jackson  Lowell,  William  Lowell  Put 
nam,  Warren  Dutton  Russell,  and  Francis  Lowell 
Button  Russell,  who  was  only  twenty  when  he  died. 
William  Putnam  was  the  son  of  the  sister  whose 
account  of  the  childhood  of  Lowell  has  been  already 
referred  to. 

Mr.  Leslie  Stephen  has  referred  pathetically  to 
Lowell's  white-heat  patriotism  as  the  war  went  on, 
—  he  watching  it  with  such  associations.  "  The 
language  of  the  most  widely  known  English  news 
papers  at  the  time  could  hardly  have  been  more 
skillfully  framed  for  the  purpose  of  irritating  Lowell, 
if  it  had  been  consciously  designed  to  that  end.  .  .  . 
He  showed  me  the  photograph  of  a  young  man  in 


POLITICS  AND  THE  WAR  181 

the  uniform  of  the  United  States  army,  and  asked 
me  whether  I  thought  that  that  lad  looked  like  '  a 
blackguard.'  On  my  giving  the  obvious  reply,  he 
told  me  that  the  portrait  represented  one  of  the 
nephews  he  had  lost  in  the  war.  Not  long  after 
ward  I  read  his  verses  in  the  second  series  of  the 
*  Biglow  Papers/  the  most  pathetic,  I  think,  that  he 
ever  wrote,  in  which  he  speaks  of  the  '  three  likely 
lads/ 

'  Whose  comin'  step  there 's  ears  thet  won't, 
No,  not  lifelong,  leave  off  awaitinV  " 

These  "three  likely  lads"  were  General  Charles 
Russell  Lowell,  his  brother  James  Jackson  Lowell, 
and  William  Lowell  Putnam,  their  cousin  and  the 
poet's  nephew. 

In  the  autumn  of  1860  Charles  Lowell  took  charge 
of  the  Mount  Savage  Iron  Works  at  Cumberland, 
Maryland.  On  the  20th  of  April,  1861,  hearing  of 
the  attack  made  the  preceding  day  in  Baltimore  on 
the  Sixth  Massachusetts  Regiment,  Lowell  instantly 
abandoned  his  position  and  set  out  for  Washington. 
He  put  himself  at  once  at  the  disposal  of  the  gov 
ernment,  and  about  the  middle  of  June  received  his 
commission  as  captain  in  the  Third  Regiment  of 
United  States  Cavalry.  For  distinguished  services 
at  Williamsburg  and  Slatersville  he  was  nominated 
for  the  brevet  of  Major.  At  South  Mountain,  in 
bearing  orders  to  General  Reno,  he  showed  a  bravery 
which  excited  universal  admiration.  In  recognition 
of  his  gallantry  in  this  battle,  General  McClellan 
assigned  to  Lowell  the  duty  of  presenting  to  the 
President  the  trophies  of  the  campaign.  In  Novem- 


182  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

ber,  1862,  he  was  ordered  to  report  to  Governor 
Andrew  for  the  purpose  of  organizing  the  Second 
Massachusetts  Cavalry,  of  which  he  was  appointed 
Colonel.  In  the  May  following  he  left  Boston  with 
his  regiment,  and  was  soon  placed  in  command 
of  the  cavalry  of  the  Department  of  Washington. 
For  many  months  he  was  occupied  in  resisting  the 
incursions  of  Mosby.  "  I  have  often  said,"  writes 
Colonel  Mosby,  "  that  of  all  the  Federal  commanders 
opposed  to  me,  I  had  the  highest  respect  for  Colonel 
Lowell,  both  as  an  officer  and  as  a  gentleman."  It 
was  at  Cedar  Creek,  while  leading  his  command, 
that  he  received  his  mortal  wound.  His  commission 
as  Brigadier-General  of  Volunteers,  "  determined  on 
days  before,"  was  signed  on  the  19th  of  October, 
too  late  for  him  to  wear  the  honor  he  had  earned  so 
well.  "  We  all  shed  tears,"  said  Custer,  "  when  we 
knew  we  had  lost  him." 

General  Lowell's  brother,  James  Jackson  Lowell, 
was  but  twenty-three  years  old  when  the  war  began. 
He  was  born  in  the  very  Elmwood  where,  as  this 
writer  hopes,  this  reader  feels  at  home.  His  early 
youth  was  spent  in  Boston,  where  he  was  a  student 
in  the  public  Latin  School.  Before  he  entered  col 
lege,  the  family  had  removed  to  Cambridge  again. 

He  spent  the  four  years  from  1854  as  an  under 
graduate  in  Cambridge,  taking  his  bachelor's  degree 
in  1858,  at  the  second  Commencement  after  his 
uncle  entered  on  his  duties  there.  He  took  the 
highest  place  in  his  class  when  he  graduated;  a 
favorite  with  his  class,  "  liked  as  much  as  he  was 
admired."  u  While  he  would  walk  a  dozen  miles 


POLITICS  AND  THE  WAR  183 

for  wild  flowers,  skate  all  day,  and  dance  as  long  as 
the  music  would  play,  he  found  no  study  too  dry, 
and  would  have  liked  to  embrace  all  science  and  all 
literature." 

He  showed  the  interest  in  public  affairs  which 
such  a  young  man  ought  to  show,  and  such  as  was 
suggested  to  him  by  his  ancestry  on  his  father's 
side  and  his  mother's  alike.  He  was  at  the  Dane 
Law  School,  —  the  school  connected  with  the  Uni 
versity  at  Cambridge,  —  when  the  war  broke  out. 
James  Lowell  and  his  cousin,  "William  Putnam,  also 
at  the  Law  School,  undertook  to  raise  recruits  for 
a  Massachusetts  regiment.  After  some  delay  they 
and  their  recruits  were  assigned  to  the  Twentieth 
Regiment,  Lowell  taking  a  commission  as  First 
Lieutenant,  and  Putnam  that  of  Second.  They 
received  their  commissions  on  the  10th  of  July. 
They  were  sent  to  the  front  in  September. 

After  a  few  days  in  Washington  they  were 
ordered  to  Poolesville  in  Maryland,  and  they  were 
encamped  there  until  October  20.  On  the  21st  of 
October  they  were  led  across  the  Potomac  by  Gen 
eral  Lane,  who  atoned  for  this  mistake  by  his  life. 
The  wretched  and  useless  battle  of  Ball's  Bluff 
was  fought,  Putnam  was  so  severely  wounded  that 
he  died  in  a  few  days,  Schmitt,  their  captain,  was 
wounded,  and  Lowell  shot  in  his  thigh.  He  re 
turned  home  until  his  wound  was  healed,  and  joined 
his  regiment  on  the  Potomac  as  the  movement  of 
McClellan  against  Richmond  went  forward.  He  saw 
rather  than  joined  in  the  fighting  at  Fair  Oaks,  and 
on  the  26th  of  June  writes,  in  good  spirits,  that 


184  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

he  has  hopes  of  seeing  Richmond  before  the  month 
is  over.  But,  alas !  on  the  29th  the  regiment  was 
ordered  to  join  McClellan's  retreat  to  the  Potomac, 
and  on  the  30th  he  received  a  mortal  wound  at 
Glen  dale. 

His  cousin,  William  Lowell  Putnam,  was  an  only 
son.  The  friend  and  teacher  of  the  two,  Professor 
Child,  says :  "  A  nobler  pair  never  took  the  field. 
Putnam,  with  his  fair  hair,  deep  eyes,  and  uncon- 
taminated  countenance,  was  the  impersonation  of 
knightly  youth.  He  was  our  Euryalus,  quo  pul- 
chrior  alter  nonfuit  ^Eneadum.  The  cousins  were 
beautifully  matched  in  person,  mental  accomplish 
ments,  and  pure  heroism  of  character." 

I  copy  Professor  Child's  words  with  a  certain 
special  tenderness  for  a  personal  remembrance  of 
"  Willie  Putnam,"  as  most  of  his  friends  called 
him.  I  was  in  Salignac's  drill  corps,  before  the  war 
began,  at  a  time  when  the  drill  was  carried  on  in 
a  large  hall,  at  the  corner  of  Summer  Street  and 
Washington  Street  in  Boston.  The  hall  was  not 
long  enough  for  the  battalion  to  form  in  line,  and 
two  right  angles  were  necessary,  so  that  we  stood  at 
parade  with  our  backs  to  three  sides  of  the  wall. 
Day  by  day,  for  I  know  not  how  many  weeks,  in 
presenting  arms  at  parade,  I  "  presented  arms," 
not  so  much  to  the  commanding  officer,  as  to  this 
beautiful  boy,  who  at  the  distance  of  thirty  or  forty 
yards  presented  arms  to  me.  Among  three  or  four 
hundred  young  men,  most  of  them  younger  than  I, 
I  did  not  know  his  name.  In  June  he  was  enlist 
ing  men,  and  Salignac  and  the  drill  corps,  and  I 


ROBERT   GOULD   SHAW 

WILLIAM    LOWELL   PUTNAM  CHARLES   RUSSELL   LOWELL 

JAMES   JACKSON   LOWELL 


POLITICS  AND  THE   WAR  185 

among  the  rest,  saw  him  no  longer.  In  October 
he  was  killed  ;  and  then  for  the  first  time,  when  I 
saw  his  picture,  did  I  know  that  the  noble,  cheerful 
face  I  had  so  often  saluted  was  that  of  this  fine 
young  man,  in  whose  career,  for  many  reasons,  I 
was  interested  so  deeply. 

Such  were  three  of  five  relatives  who  went  to  the 
war,  almost  from  Elmwood  itself.  One  sees  how 
Lowell's  personal  interest  in  them  affected  all  he 
wrote  in  poetry  or  prose  in  the  great  crisis. 

Professor  Child,  whom  I  cited  in  the  passage 
above,  took  the  most  eager  interest  in  the  war,  as, 
indeed,  in  one  way  or  another,  all  the  professors  at 
Cambridge  did.  He  was  one  of  the  Faculty  who 
had  joined  it  since  they  dragged  Lowell  through 
college  "  by  the  hair  of  his  head,"  as  he  and  Cutler 
dragged  Loring  through.  Eager  in  everything  in 
the  way  of  public  spirit,  Professor  Child  made  it  his 
special  duty  to  prepare  a  "  Song-book  "  for  the  sol 
diers  who  were  going  to  the  field.  Who  is  doing  it 
now  for  the  liberators  of  to-day  ?  He  made  every 
body  who  could,  write  a  war-song,  and  he  printed  a 
little  book  of  these  songs,  with  the  music,  which 
he  used  to  send  to  the  front  with  every  marching 
regiment.  I  had  the  pleasure  of  telling  him  once 
that  I  had  heard  one  of  his  songs  sung  by  some  pri 
vates  of  our  Twenty-fourth  in  the  camp  before  Ber 
muda  Hundred.  This  curious  collection  is  already 
rare.  It  was  called  "  War  Songs  for  Freemen,"  and 
was  dedicated  to  the  army  of  the  United  States. 
Professor  Child  enlisted  Charles  T.  Brooks,  the 
Newport  poet,  Dr.  Hedge,  Dr.  Holmes,  and  Mrs. 


186  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

Howe,  both  the  Lelands,  Mrs.  T.  Sedgwick,  and 
some  anonymous  writers,  to  join  in  furnishing  songs. 
He  included  some  good  translations  from  the  Ger 
man.  He  wrote  two  or  three  himself,  which  show 
his  fun  and  audacity.  Here  is  the  last  verse  of 
"  The  Lass  of  the  Pamunky  :  "  — 

"  Fair  hands  !  but  not  too  nice  or  coy 

To  soothe  my  pangs  with  service  tender. 
Soft  eyes  !  that  watched  a  wasted  boy, 

All  loving,  as  your  land's  defender  !  — 
Oh  !  I  was  then  a  wretched  shade, 

But  now  I  'm  strong  and  growing  chunky  — 
So  Forward  !  and  God  bless  the  maid 

That  saved  my  life  on  the  Pamunky  !  " 

Here  is  a  new  verse  of  "  Lilliburlero  :  " — 

"  « Well,  Uncle  Sam,'  says  Jefferson  D., 

Lilliburlero,  Old  Uncle  Sam, 
'  You  '11  have  to  join  my  Confed'racy,' 
Lilliburlero,  Old  Uncle  Sam. 
'Lero,  lero,  that  don't  appear,  O  !     That  don't  appear,'  says  Old 

Uncle  Sam. 
*  Lero,  lero,  filibuster©  !     That  don't  appear,'  says  Old  Uncle  Sam." 

Mr.  Child  was  appointed  professor  in  rhetoric  in 
1851,  and  by  a  new  appointment  in  1876  professor 
of  the  English  language  and  literature.  It  is  inter 
esting  to  see  that,  although  the  use  of  the  English 
language  had  been  admirably  taught  at  Harvard 
long  before,  there  was  no  professor  of  English  liter 
ature  for  two  centuries  and  a  half  after  the  college 
was  founded.  Is  there  one  at  Oxford  or  at  the 
English  Cambridge  to-day  ? 

How  well  fitted  Mr.  Child  was  for  these  positions 
his  published  series  of  ballads  and  other  works  show. 
His  recent  death  gives  me  a  right  to  speak  here  of 


FRANCIS   JAMES   CHILD 


POLITICS  AND  THE  WAR  187 

the  tender  love  with  which  he  was  regarded  by  all 
the  Cambridge  circle,  and  of  the  unselfish  interest 
with  which  he  gave  time  and  work  to  the  help  of 
all  around  him.  One  is  glad  to  see  this  interest 
surviving  in  the  lives  of  his  children. 

I  am  not  sure  that  this  story  of  those  days  is 
quite  decorous  enough  for  print.  But  I  will  risk  it. 
Professor  Calvin  Ellis  Stowe,  who  was  a  classmate 
of  Longfellow's,  told  me  that  in  the  early  days 
of  '61  he  met  Longfellow  in  the  streets  of  Boston. 
Both  of  them  were  in  haste,  but  Longfellow  had 
time  enough  to  ask  if  the  Andover  gentlemen  were 
all  alive  to  their  duty  to  the  nation.  Stowe  said 
he  thought  they  were,  and  Longfellow  said,  "  If  the 
New  Testament  won't  do,  you  must  give  them  the 
Old."  Professor  Stowe  told  me  this  in  August  of 
1861,  after  the  anniversary  exercises  of  the  class 
at  Andover.  The  division  between  Rehoboam  and 
Jeroboam  had  naturally  played  a  very  important 
part  in  the  chapel  exercises,  with  the  obvious  dis 
tinction  that  in  our  time  it  was  the  North  which  was 
in  the  right  and  the  South  which  was  in  the  wrong. 

I  am  permitted  to  copy  the  following  scraps  from 
the  journal  of  one  of  Lowell's  pupils  at  that  time  :  — 

"  In  '64,  when  I  had  come  back  from  a  service 
mostly  civil,  but  under  direction  of  General  Saxton, 
on  Port  Royal  Islands,  I  had  to  give  the  college 
steward  a  bond  to  secure  whatever  dues  I  might 
incur.  Lowell  volunteered  to  sign  the  bond,  and  to 
say  that  he  had  perfect  confidence  in  me.  Decem 
ber  22  he  called  at  Divinity  Hall,  to  invite  me  to 
a  five  o'clock  Christmas  dinner ;  again  on  Christmas 


188  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

to  turn  the  hour  into  four  o'clock.  The  other 
guests  were  John  Holmes  and  Caroline  Norton,  a 
young  man  and  a  niece  of  the  host.  Each  man 
was  impressed  into  escort  duty  to  a  woman,  and 
I  was  Mabel's  escort  to  the  table. 

"  The  dinner  and  the  chat  were  delightful. 
Holmes  and  Lowell  sharpened  their  wits  upon  each 
other,  while  the  rest  of  us  ate  and  laughed.  I  was 
the  only  obdurate  that  would  not  take  a  smile  of 
wine.  After  dinner  we  were  entertained  with  some 
of  Blake's  curious  pictures,  with  snowflake  shapes, 
and  with  books.  Lowell  had  been  '  weeding  his 
back  garden,'  and  he  offered  me  the  little  stock  of 
duplicates  and  obsoletes  :  a  Webster's  quarto  dic 
tionary  was  one  of  the  books,  and  the  evening  was 
Christmas ;  but  the  boys  had  a  notion  that  his  in 
come  was  almost  pinchingly  small  for  a  man  in  his 
place ;  so,  in  the  hope  that  he  might  second-hand 
them  off  for  five  or  ten  dollars,  I  declined  them, 
and  have  been  sorry  ever  since.  I  should  have 
known  that  if  he  wanted  to  sell  them  he  would  not 
even  have  shown  them  to  me,  and  that  he  did  want 
to  put  them  where  they  would  be  helpful  and  well 
used." 

I  might  almost  say  that  such  daily  associations 
with  the  war  account  for  the  form  and  spirit  alike 
of  the  "  Commemoration  Ode."  No  one  who  was 
present  when  that  ode  was  delivered  can  forget  the 
occasion.  It  was  in  every  regard  historical.  Peace 
was  concluded,  and  the  country  drew  a  long  breath 
with  joy  for  the  first  time.  An  immense  assembly 
of  the  graduates  came  together.  As  many  of  them 


HENRY  WADSWORTH    LONGFELLOW  (1860) 


POLITICS  AND  THE  WAR  189 

as  could  filed  into  the  church  for  religious  services. 
Under  the  lead  of  Mr.  Paine,  the  professor  of  music, 
a  college  chorus  sang  "  Salvam  fac  rempublicam." 
I  think  this  was  the  first  time  that  the  music  now 
well  known  was  used  for  those  words.  On  such 
occasions  at  Cambridge  the  graduates  entered  the 
church  in  the  order  of  their  seniority.  I  remember 
that  on  that  occasion  the  attendance  was  so  large 
that  my  own  class,  which  was  twenty-six  years  out 
of  college,  were  among  the  last  persons  who  could 
enter  the  building.  We  stood  in  the  aisles,  because 
there  were  no  seats  for  us. 

After  these  services  the  whole  body  of  the  alumni 
sat  at  a  Spartan  college  feast  in  that  part  of  "  the 
yard,"  as  we  say  at  Cambridge,  which  is  between 
Harvard  and  Holden  Halls.  And  there  Lowell  de 
livered  his  "  Commemoration  Ode."  His  own  intense 
interest  was  evident  enough,  but  it  was  reflected  in 
what  I  might  call  the  passionate  interest  with  which 
people  heard.  It  was  said  afterwards,  and  I  think 
this  appears  in  his  letters,  that  the  final  business  of 
writing  this  wonderful  poem  had  all  been  done  in 
forty-eight  hours  before  he  delivered  it.  But  then, 
as  the  reader  sees,  it  had  been  more  than  four  years 
in  the  writing.  The  inspiration  had  come  from  day 
to  day,  and  he  poured  out  here  the  expression  of 
what  he  had  been  thinking  and  feeling,  in  joy  and 
sorrow,  in  hope  and  fear,  in  learning  and  forget 
ting,  for  all  that  period  of  crisis  and  strain. 

I  believe  I  may  tell  —  and  it  shall  close  these 
broken  reminiscences  of  the  war  —  a  story  which 
was  familiarly  told  at  the  time,  and  which  is  true. 


190  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

I  have  heard  it  in  one  or  two  forms,  and  to  secure 
accuracy  now  I  have  asked  the  gentleman  whom  I 
may  call  the  hero  of  the  story  for  his  own  account 
of  it.  He  was  one  of  Lowell's  pupils,  in  the  "  bat 
tle  class  "  of  1862.  He  has  sent  it  to  me  in  the 
following  words  :  — 

"I  spent  the  night  before  Commemoration  Day 
on  a  lounge  in  Hollis  21?  the  room  of  my  classmate 
Hudson,  who  was  a  tutor.  I  could  not  afterwards 
remember  dreaming  of  anything  in  particular ;  but 
as  I  woke  I  heard, 

*  And  what  they  dare  to  dream  of,  dare  to  die  for.' 

" '  Kather  a  good  sentiment,'  I  said  to  myself ; 
'  and  it  seems  to  be  appropriate  to  the  day,'  —  then 
just  dawning.  And  so  I  dropped  off  again. 

"  The  dinner  was  spread,  as  you  remember,  in 
the  green  bounded  by  Harvard,  Hollis,  and  Holden. 
My  seat  was  just  about  in  the  middle.  Mr.  Lowell 
was  a  few  rods  nearer  Holden  and  a  good  deal 
nearer  Hollis,  —  about  under  the  more  southerly 
window  of  Hollis  21.  When  he  rose,  there  was  a 
prolonged  closing  of  the  ranks,  —  I  remember  the 
rustle  of  many  feet  on  the  grass,  —  and  Mr.  Lowell 
waited  till  all  was  quiet  before  he  began  reading. 
As  he  read,  when  he  came  to  the  words, 

*  Their  higher  instinct  knew 
Those  love  her  best,'  — 

I  began  to  feel,  not  that  I  had  heard  this  before, 
but  that  something  familiar  was  coming. 

1  Who  to  themselves  are  true,' 

went  on  the  reader.     '  Hullo  ! '  said  I  to  myself,  '  I 
ought  to  know  the  next  line.' 


POLITICS  AND  THE  WAR  191 

'  And  what  they  dare  '  — 

" '  Yes,  but  it  is  n't  going  to  rhyme/  and  this 
•without  distinctly  repeating  the  rest  of  the  line." 

When  my  friend  had  observed  that  "  die  for  " 
would  not  rhyme  with  "  true/'  Lowell  came  to  his 
relief  by  saying, 

"  And  what  they  dare  to  dream  of,  dare  to  do." 

So  well  authenticated  a  story  of  sympathy  and 
telepathy  seems  worth  repeating. 


CHAPTER  XII 

TWENTY   YEARS    OF    HARVARD 

MR.  LOWELL'S  real  connection  with  the  daily 
work  of  the  college  ceased  in  1876,  when  he  ac 
cepted  the  offer  of  the  mission  to  Spain.  It  cov 
ered  the  period  when  he  wrote  most,  and  when,  as 
his  cousin  has  said  so  well,  in  the  passage  I  have 
cited,  his  work  in  prose  and  poetry  proved  to  be 
most  satisfactory  to  himself.  His  duty  afterwards 
as  a  diplomatist,  in  Spain  and  in  England,  was  of 
value  to  the  country  and  of  credit  to  himself.  And 
his  life  as  a  man  of  letters  had  prepared  him  for 
such  work.  But,  all  the  same,  it  is  as  a  man  of 
letters  that  he  will  be  most  generally  remembered. 

During  the  twenty-one  years  from  1855  to  1876 
the  college  was  going  through  the  change  which 
has  made  it  the  university  which  it  is.  It  had 
not  only  enlarged  in  the  number  of  pupils,  but 
the  purposes  and  range  of  all  persons  connected 
with  it  widened  with  every  year.  This  change 
from  the  "  seminary,"  as  President  Quincy  used  to 
call  it,  to  the  university  of  to-day  has  not  been 
wrought  by  any  spasmodic  revolution  planned  by 
either  of  the  governing  bodies  at  any  given  time. 
It  has  come  about,  healthy  and  strong,  in  the  growth 
of  the  country  —  let  us  even  say  in  the  improvement 
of  the  world. 


TWENTY  YEARS  OF  HARVARD  193 

Presidents  Quincy,  Everett,  Sparks,  and  Walker 
were  all  engaged  in  promoting  the  evolution  of  the 
university.  After  the  close  of  that  series  come 
Thomas  Hill  and  Charles  William  Eliot,  the  present 
incumbent,  to  whose  energy,  foresight,  and  courage 
so  much  of  what  may  be  called  this  revolution  is 
due.  I  have  already  made  some  notes  here  of  Mr. 
Quincy  and  Dr.  Walker.  It  was  in  Walker's  admin 
istration  that  Lowell  returned  to  the  college  as 
Smith  professor. 

Cornelius  Conway  Felton,  who  succeeded  Dr. 
Walker,  had  been  the  Greek  professor,  and  had  dis 
tinguished  himself  in  his  place  as  an  editor  of  Homer 
and  in  papers  on  subjects  of  Greek  literature.  Per 
haps  he  soon  wore  out  his  hopes  for  classes  of  school 
boys.  Certainly  in  my  time  and  Lowell's,  when  we 
were  undergraduates,  he  made  little  or  no  effort  as 
a  teacher  to  open  out  the  work  of  the  Greek  poets 
whom  we  read.  Alkestis  or  the  Iliad  were  literally 
mere  text-books.  All  the  same,  the  boys  believed 
in  Felton.  I  remember  one  scene  of  great  excite 
ment  when  he  was  a  professor,  when  we  thought  we 
were  very  badly  used  by  the  government,  as  perhaps 
we  were.  There  was  a  great  crowd  of  us  in  front 
of  Holworthy,  and  Felton  appeared  on  the  steps 
of  Stoughton  or  at  a  window.  Somebody  shouted, 
"  Hear  Felton  !  hear  Felton  !  he  tells  us  the  truth," 
and  the  noisy  mob  was  still  to  listen.  A  man  might 
be  glad  to  have  these  words  carved  on  his  tombstone. 

When  with  other  men  of  letters,  Dr.  Felton  was 
charming.  And  his  kindness  to  his  old  pupils  till 
they  died  was  something  marvelous.  The  published 


194  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

Sumner  letters,  the  Longfellow  letters,  and  other 
correspondence  of  the  men  of  that  time,  with  many 
of  his  careful  reviews,  and  an  occasional  pamphlet, 
perhaps  on  some  subject  of  controversy  now  forgot 
ten,  show  how  highly  he  was  prized  in  his  day  and 
how  well  he  deserved  such  esteem.  For  many  years 
he  was  one  of  the  most  acceptable  writers  for  the 
"North  American  Review."  He  died,  suddenly, 
after  less  than  two  years  of  service  as  President. 

President  Felton's  successor,  Thomas  Hill,  was 
a  graduate  of  Harvard,  as  all  her  presidents  have 
been  since  Chauncy  died  in  1672.  Dr.  Hill  was  of 
a  noble  family,  —  if  we  count  nobility  on  the  true 
standards,  —  who  were  driven  out  of  England  by  the 
Birmingham  riots  of  1791,  and  settled  near  Philadel 
phia.  Dr.  Hill  was  appointed  president  of  Antioch 
College,  Ohio,  in  1859,  and,  after  a  very  successful 
administration  there,  he  was  inaugurated  at  Cam 
bridge  in  1862.  At  Antioch  he  had  succeeded 
Horace  Mann  in  the  presidency. 

Dr.  Hill's  health  failed,  and  he  resigned  in  1868, 
leaving  behind  him  charming  memories  of  his  devo 
tion  to  duty  and  of  the  simplicity  of  his  charac 
ter.  I  called  upon  him  once,  with  Dr.  Newman 
Hall,  when  he  was  in  this  country.  It  was  delight 
ful  to  see  the  enthusiasm  with  which  Dr.  Hill  spoke 
of  the  pleasure  he  expected  in  the  evenings  of  the 
approaching  winter,  from  studying,  with  his  charm 
ing  wife,  the  new  text  of  the  Syriac  version  of  the 
New  Testament,  which  had  then  just  been  edited 
by  Cureton.  He  was  one  of  the  most  distinguished 
mathematicians  of  his  time.  Here  is  an  amusing 


TWENTY  YEARS  OF  HARVARD  195 

note  to  him  from  Lowell  about  the  arboriculture  of 
the  college  yard. 

MY  DEAR  DR.  HILL,  —  I  have  been  meaning 
to  speak  to  you  for  some  time  about  something 
which  I  believe  you  are  interested  in  as  well  as 
myself,  and,  not  having  spoken,  I  make  occasion 
to  write  this  note.  Something  ought  to  be  done 
about  the  trees  in  the  college  yard.  That  is  my 
thesis,  and  my  corollary  is  that  you  are  the  man  to 
do  it.  They  remind  me  always  of  a  young  author's 
first  volume  of  poems.  There  are  too  many  of  'em, 
and  too  many  of  one  kind.  If  they  were  not 
planted  in  such  formal  rows,  they  would  typify  very 
well  John  Bull's  notion  of  "  our  democracy,"  where 
every  tree  is  its  neighbor's  enemy,  and  all  turn  out 
scrubs  in  the  end,  because  none  can  develop  fairly. 
Then  there  is  scarce  anything  but  American  elms. 
I  have  nothing  to  say  against  the  tree  in  itself.  I 
have  some  myself  whose  trunks  I  look  on  as  the 
most  precious  baggage  I  am  responsible  for  in  the 
journey  of  life  ;  but  planted  as  they  are  in  the  yard, 
there  's  no  chance  for  one  in  ten.  If  our  buildings 
so  nobly  dispute  architectural  preeminence  with  cot 
ton  mills,  perhaps  it  is  all  right  that  the  trees  should 
become  spindles ;  but  I  think  Hesiod  (who  knew 
something  of  country  matters)  was  clearly  right  in 
his  half  being  better  than  the  whole,  and  nowhere 
more  so  than  in  the  matter  of  trees.  There  are  two 
English  beeches  in  the  yard  which  would  become 
noble  trees  if  the  elms  would  let  'em  alone.  As  it 
is,  they  are  in  danger  of  starving.  Now,  as  you 


196  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

are  our  Kubernetes,  I  want  you  to  take  the  'elm  in 
hand.  We  want  more  variety,  more  grouping.  We 
want  to  learn  that  one  fine  tree  is  worth  more  than 
any  mob  of  second-rate  ones.  We  want  to  take 
a  leaf  out  of  Chaucer's  book,  and  understand  that 
in  a  stately  grove  every  tree  must  "  stand  well  from 
his  fellow  apart."  A  doom  hangs  over  us  in  the 
matter  of  architecture,  but  if  we  will  only  let  a  tree 
alone,  it  will  build  itself  with  a  nobleness  of  propor 
tion  and  grace  of  detail  that  Giotto  himself  might 
have  envied.  Nor  should  the  pruning  as  now  be 
trusted  to  men  who  get  all  they  cut  off,  and  whose 
whole  notion  of  pruning,  accordingly,  is  "  ax  and 
it  shall  be  given  unto  you."  Do,  pray,  take  this 
matter  into  your  own  hands  —  for  you  know  how 
to  love  a  tree  —  and  give  us  a  modern  instance  of  a 
wise  saw.  Be  remembered  among  your  other  good 
things  as  the  president  that  planted  the  groups  of 
evergreens  for  the  wind  to  dream  of  the  sea  in  all 
summer,  and  for  the  snowflakes  to  roost  on  all 
winter,  and  believe  me  (at  the  end  of  my  sheet, 
though  not  of  my  sermon)  always  cordially  yours, 

J.  E.  LOWELL. 

ELMWOOD,  December  8, 1863. 

After  President  Hill's  resignation,  Dr.  Andrew 
Preston  Peabody  acted  as  president  until  the 
appointment  in  1869  of  Mr.  Eliot. 

I  have  already  spoken,  in  one  connection  or  an 
other,  of  the  professors  to  whom  Lowell  was  most 
closely  drawn,  —  with  one  or  two  exceptions.  Dr. 
Asa  Gray,  the  distinguished  chief  of  botany  in 


TWENTY  YEARS  OF  HARVARD  197 

America,  made  his  home  a  centre  of  all  that  was 
charming  and  interesting  in  the  delightful  circle  of 
Cambridge  society.  Nothing  could  be  more  inter 
esting  than  the  simplicity  of  the  spirited  conversa 
tion  of  this  most  learned  man,  and  the  ease  with 
which,  while  he  really  knew  almost  everything  that 
was  worth  knowing,  he  spoke,  with  utter  absence  of 
effect  or  visible  erudition.  Where  a  working  gar 
dener  would  tell  you  with  delight  that  this  or  that 
plant  was  the  "  Tomfoolaria  eruditissima"  Gray 
would  say,  "  Oh !  that 's  one  of  those  Australian 
sandworts."  When  he  was  still  as  fresh  and  cheer 
ful  as  a  boy,  I  heard  him  say,  "  It  is  great  fun  to 
be  seventy  years  old.  You  do  not  have  to  know 
everything." 

Another  of  his  colleagues  who  gave  distinction  to 
the  college,  in  America  and  in  Europe,  was  the  late 
Josiah  Parsons  Cooke,  whose  position  as  a  teacher 
and  in  the  ranks  of  original  students  in  chemistry 
is  so  well  known. 

Lowell's  own  charming  poem  to  Agassiz  will  be 
recalled  by  every  one  who  cares  for  his  life  at  Har 
vard.  Not  long  after  Agassiz  had  been  invited  from 
Switzerland  to  lecture  before  the  Lowell  Institute, 
he  was  appointed  to  a  professorship  in  Cambridge, 
and  he  accepted  the  appointment.  He  lived  in 
Cambridge  from  that  time  until  he  died,  loving  and 
beloved,  in  1873.  Mr.  John  Amory  Lowell,  the 
cousin  of  our  Lowell,  in  his  plans  for  the  Lowell 
Institute,  engaged  Louis  Agassiz  to  deliver  one  of 
their  courses  in  1847.  His  arrival  in  America 
may  be  spoken  of  as  marking  an  era  in  education. 


198  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

Indeed,  if  the  Lowell  Institute  had  never  done 
anything  else  for  America  than  it  did  when  it  "  im 
ported  Agassiz,"  it  would  have  a  perpetual  claim 
for  our  gratitude.  With  his  arrival  there  was  ended, 
once  and  forever,  the  poor  habit  of  studying  Nature 
through  the  eyes  of  other  observers.  Men  learned 
again  the  lesson  which  makes  them  see  where  they 
look.  For  it  may  be  fairly  said  that  Agassiz  cre 
ated  here  the  school  of  original  study  which  has 
for  a  generation  past  directed  the  progress  of  natu 
ral  science  in  America.  I  believe  I  ought  to  say 
that  the  phrase  "  imported  Agassiz/'  which  I  have 
ventured  to  quote,  is  Lowell's  own.  In  his  address 
at  the  Quarter-Millennial  of  the  college  he  had 
the  hardihood  to  say  that  Harvard  had  not  yet 
developed  any  first-rate  educator,  "  for  we  imported 
Agassiz." 

I  have  never  forgotten  the  enthusiasm  of  Agas- 
siz's  audience  the  first  time  I  ever  heard  him.  His 
subject  was  the  First  Ascent  of  the  Jungfrau,  the 
maiden  mountain  which  had  never  been  scaled  by  man 
until  Agassiz  led  the  way.  He  told  us,  with  eager 
memory,  of  all  the  preparations  made  for  what  men 
thought  the  hopeless  invasion  of  those  untrodden 
snows,  of  the  personnel  of  the  party,  of  their  last 
night  and  early  morning  start  at  some  encampment 
halfway  up ;  and  then,  almost  step  by  step,  of  the 
sheer  ascent  at  the  last,  until,  man  by  man,  one  after 
another,  each  man  stood  alone,  where  two  cannot 
stand  together,  on  that  little  triangle  of  rock  which 
is  the  summit.  "  And  I  looked  down  into  Swisser- 
land."  As  I  heard  him  utter  these  simple  words  of 


LOUIS  AGASSIZ 


TWENTY  YEARS  OF  HARVARD  199 

triumph,  I  said  that  Mr.  Lowell  might  take  credit 
to  himself  for  bringing  before  our  audience  the  no 
blest  and  best  specimen,  so  far  discovered,  of  that 
greatest  species  of  mammalia  —  long  studied,  but 
as  yet  little  known  —  of  the  very  finest  type,  from 
the  widely  scattered  genus  of  the  race  of  MAN. 

The  simplicity  of  Agassiz's  mode  of  address  cap 
tivated  all  hearers.  He  put  himself  at  once  in  touch 
with  the  common-school  teachers.  He  had  none  of 
that  absurd  conceit  which  has  sometimes  parted  col 
lege  professors  from  sympathetic  work  with  their 
brothers  and  sisters  who  have  the  first  duty,  in  the 
district  and  town  schools,  in  the  infinite  work  of 
instruction  and  education. 

Agassiz's  Cambridge  life  brought  into  Cambridge 
a  good  many  of  his  European  friends,  and  broke 
up  the  strictness  of  a  village  coterie  by  the  accent, 
not  to  say  the  customs,  of  cosmopolitan  life.  To 
say  true,  the  denizens  of  the  forest  sometimes  inter 
mixed  closely  with  the  well-trained  European  scholars. 
There  used  to  be  a  fine  story  of  a  dinner-party  at 
Dr.  Arnold  Guyot's  when  he  lived  at  Cambridge. 
An  admiring  friend  had  sent  Guyot  as  a  present 
a  black  bear,  which  was  confined  in  the  cellar  of 
his  house.  Another  friend  had  sent  him  a  little 
barrel  of  cider,  which  was  also  in  the  cellar.  As  the 
dinner  went  on  upstairs,  ominous  rumblings  were 
heard  below,  and  suddenly  an  attendant  rushed  in 
on  the  feast,  announcing  that  the  bear  had  got  loose, 
had  been  drinking  the  cider,  had  got  drunk,  and 
was  now  coming  upstairs.  The  guests  fled  through 
windows  and  doors.  I  am  not  sure  that  Lowell  was 


200  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

one  of  them,  but  the  anecdote  belongs  in  notices  of 
his  friends. 

I  should  not  dare  speak  of  a  "  village  coterie," 
nor  intimate  that  at  Cambridge  there  were  men  who 
had  never  heard  of  Fujiyama,  or  of  places,  indeed, 
not  twenty  miles  away,  but  that  these  anecdotes 
belong  a  generation  and  more  ago. 

One  of  Lowell's  fellow  professors  told  me  this 
curious  story,  which  will  illustrate  the  narrowness 
of  New  England  observation  at  that  time.  There 
appeared  at  Cambridge  in  the  year  1859  a  young 
gentleman  named  Robert  Todd  Lincoln,  who  has 
been  already  quoted,  and  is  quite  well  known  in  this 
country  and  in  England.  This  young  man  wished 
to  enter  Harvard  College,  and  his  father,  one  Abra 
ham  Lincoln,  who  has  since  been  known  in  the 
larger  world,  had  fortified  him  with  a  letter  of  intro 
duction  to  Dr.  Walker,  the  president  of  the  college. 
This  letter  of  introduction  was  given  by  one  Stephen 
A.  Douglas,  who  was  a  person  also  then  quite  well 
known  in  political  life,  and  he  presented  the  young 
man  to  Dr.  Walker  as  being  the  son  of  his  friend 
Abraham  Lincoln,  "  with  whom  I  have  lately  been 
canvassing  the  State  of  Illinois."  When  this  letter, 
now  so  curious  in  history,  was  read,  Lowell  said  to 
my  friend  who  tells  me  the  story,  "  I  suppose  I  am 
the  only  man  in  this  room  who  has  ever  heard  of 
this  Abraham  Lincoln  ;  but  he  is  the  person  with 
whom  Douglas  has  been  traveling  up  and  down  in 
Illinois,  canvassing  the  State  in  their  new  Western 
fashion,  as  representatives  of  the  two  parties,  each 
of  them  being  the  candidate  for  the  vacant  seat  in 


TWENTY  YEARS  OF  HARVARD  201 

the  Senate."  What  is  more,  my  friend  says  it  is 
probably  true  that  at  the  moment  when  this  letter 
was  presented  by  young  Robert  Lincoln,  none  of 
the  faculty  of  Harvard  College,  excepting  Lowell, 
had  ever  heard  of  Abraham  Lincoln.  The  story  is 
a  good  one,  as  showing  how  far  it  was  in  those  days 
possible  for  a  circle  of  intelligent  men  to  know  lit 
tle  or  nothing  of  what  was  happening  in  the  world 
beyond  the  sound  of  their  college  bell.1 

It  would  be  almost  of  course  that,  in  a  series  of 
reminiscences  which  are  not  simply  about  Lowell 
but  about  his  friends,  I  should  include  some  careful 
history  of  the  Saturday  Club,  which  has  held  its 
regular  meetings  up  to  this  time  from  the  date  of 
the  dinner-party  given  by  Mr.  Phillips,  as  already 
described  in  the  history  of  the  "  Atlantic."  But 
that  story  has  been  so  well  told  by  Mr.  Morse  in 
his  memoir  of  Dr.  Holmes,  and  by  Mr.  Cooke  in 
the  "  New  England  Magazine,"  that  I  need  hardly 
do  more  than  repeat  what  has  been  said  before. 
In  Morse's  "  Life  of  Dr.  Holmes "  there  are  two 
pages  of  admirably  well-selected  pictures  of  some  of 
the  members  best  known.  When  the  reader  sees  the 
names  of  gentlemen  who  have  attended  the  club 
more  or  less  regularly  in  forty  years,  he  will  readily 
understand  why  Emerson  and  Holmes  and  Lowell 
and  others  of  their  contemporaries  have  spoken  of 
the  talk  there  as  being  as  good  talk  as  they  had 

1  This  anecdote  arrested  attention  when  it  was  first  published, 
and  I  received  more  than  one  note  explaining  to  me  that  it  could 
not  be  true. 

All  the  same  it  is  true.  And  I  took  care  to  verify  the  dates  of  the 
several  steps  of  the  story. 


202  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

ever  heard  anywhere.  Holmes' s  list,  besides  him 
self,  was  Emerson,  Hawthorne,  Longfellow;,  Lowell, 
Motley,  Whipple,  Whittier,  Professors  Agassiz  and 
Peirce ;  John  Sullivan  Dwight,  Governor  Andrew, 
Richard  Henry  Dana,  Jr.,  and  Charles  Stunner, 
Presidents  Felton  and  Eliot,  Professors  Norton  and 
Goodwin,  William  Hickling  Prescott,  Thomas  Gold 
Appleton,  John  Murray  Forbes,  John  Elliot  Cabot, 
Henry  James,  William  Dean  Howells,  Thomas 
Bailey  Aldrich,  William  Morris  Hunt,  Charles  Fran 
cis  Adams,  Francis  Parkman,  James  Freeman  Clarke, 
Judge  Lowell,  Judge  Hoar,  George  Frisbie  Hoar, 
and  Bishop  Brooks. 

One  of  the  last  times  when  I  saw  Lowell  and 
Emerson  together  was  on  the  18th  of  July,  1867, 
when  Emerson  delivered  his  second  Phi  Beta  Kappa 
address.  It  had  never  happened  before,  I  think, 
that  the  same  orator  should  have  spoken  twice  be 
fore  Phi  Beta  Kappa  with  an  interval  of  thirty  years 
between  the  orations ;  nor  is  it  probable  that  such 
a  thing  will  ever  happen  again.  In  1837  the  word 
Transcendentalist  was  new,  and  it  was  considered 
"  good  form "  to  ridicule  the  Transcendentalists, 
and  especially  to  ridicule  Emerson.  Yet  he  had  his 
admirers  then,  especially  his  admirers  in  college, 
where  the  recollections  of  his  poetry  and  philosophy, 
as  shown  when  he  was  an  undergraduate,  had  not 
died  out.  A  few  years  ago  I  printed  his  two  Bow- 
doin  prize  dissertations,  written  when  he  was  seven 
teen  and  eighteen  years  of  age,  and  they  are  enough 
to  show  that  the  boy,  at  that  age,  was  father  of 
the  man.  When  he  spoke  in  1837,  the  oration  was 


CHARLES   ELIOT    NORTON" 


TWENTY  YEARS  OF  HARVARD  203 

received  in  a  certain  patronizing  way  by  his  seniors. 
Mr.  Cabot  says,  "  He  was  regarded  as  a  promising 
young  beginner,  from  whom  a  fair  poetical  speech 
might  be  expected,"  and  the  address  was  spoken  of 
with  a  gay  badinage  such  as  could  not  be  called 
criticism.  I  remember,  at  the  frugal  dinner-party 
of  Phi  Beta  Kappa  after  the  oration  of  1837,  Mr. 
Edward  Everett,  who  was  an  enthusiastic  Cambridge 
man  and  college  man  and  Phi  Beta  man,  said  with 
perfect  good  nature  of  the  Transcendentalists,  that 
their  utterances  seemed  to  him  to  be  compounded 
like  the  bolts  of  Jupiter,  — 

"  Tres  imbris  torti  radios,  tres  nubis  aquosse 
Addiderant,  rutili  tres  ignis,  et  alitis  Austri," 

and  made  this  extempore  translation :  — 

"  Three  parts  were  raging  fire,  and  three  were  whelming  water, 
But  three  were  thirsty  cloud,  and  three  were  empty  wind  ! " 

Emerson  was  too  young  and  too  modest,  and  had 
too  much  real  regard  and  respect  for  Everett,  to 
make  the  reply  which  one  thinks  of  now  :  "  What 
ever  the  bolts  were  made  of,  they  were  thunder 
bolts  ;  and  from  Vulcan's  time  to  this  time,  people 
had  better  stand  out  from  under  when  a  thunder 
bolt  is  falling."  I  can  see  Emerson  now,  as  he 
smiled  and  was  silent. 

After  thirty  years  people  did  not  say  much  about 
"  thirsty  cloud  "  or  "  empty  wind."  Emerson  was 
in  the  zenith  of  his  fame.  He  was  "  the  Buddha 
of  the  West,"  —  that  is  Doctor  Holmes's  phrase. 
He  was  "  the  Yankee  Plato,"  —  I  believe  that  is 
Lowell's.  And  Phi  Beta  made  amends  for  any 


204  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

vague  questioning  in  the  past  by  the  enthusiasm 
with  which  it  received  him  for  the  second  time. 

A  queer  thing  happened  on  that  morning.  Emer 
son  had  a  passion  to  the  last  for  changing  the  order 
of  his  utterances.  He  would  put  the  tenth  sheet 
in  place  of  the  fifth,  and  the  fifth  in  place  of  the 
fifteenth,  up  to  the  issue  of  the  last  "  extra  "  of  an 
oration.  It  was  Miss  Ellen  Emerson,  I  think,  who 
took  upon  herself  the  duty  of  putting  these  sheets 
in  order  on  this  occasion,  and  sewing  them  so  stiffly 
together  that  they  could  not  be  twitched  apart  by 
any  sudden  movement  at  the  desk.  But  the  fact 
that  they  were  sewed  together  was  an  embarrass 
ment  to  him.  What  was  worse  was  that  he  met  his 
brother,  William  Emerson,  that  morning.  I  think 
they  looked  over  the  address  together,  and  in  do 
ing  so  it  happened  that  Waldo  Emerson  took  Wil 
liam  Emerson's  glasses  and  William  took  Waldo's. 
Waldo  did  not  discover  his  error  till  he  stood  in  the 
pulpit  before  the  assembly.  Worse  than  either, 
perhaps,  some  too  careful  janitor  had  carried  away 
the  high  desk  from  the  pulpit  of  the  church,  and 
had  left  Emerson,  tall  and  with  the  wrong  spec 
tacles,  to  read  the  address  far  below  his  eyes.  It 
was  not  till  the  first  passage  of  the  address  was 
finished  that  this  difficulty  of  the  desk  could  be 
rectified ;  but  the  whole  audience  was  in  sympathy 
with  him,  and  the  little  hitch,  if  one  may  call  it  so, 
which  this  made  seemed  only  to  bring  them  closer 
together. 

The  address  will  be  found  in  the  eighth  volume 
of  his  works,  and  will  be  remembered  by  every  one 


TWENTY  YEARS  OF  HARVARD  205 

who  heard  it ;  but,  on  the  whole,  what  impresses  me 
the  most  in  memory  is  the  hearty  thoroughness  and 
cordiality  of  Lowell's  congratulations  when  Emerson 
turned  round  after  finishing  the  oration.  "Par 
nobile  fratrum"  as  one  said ;  and  one  felt  glad  to 
have  seen  two  such  men  together  on  such  a  day. 
Lowell  himself  said  of  it,  a  few  days  later  :  — 

"  Emerson's  oration  was  more  disjointed  than 
usual  even  with  him.  It  began  nowhere  and  ended 
everywhere;  and  yet,  as  always  with  that  divine 
man,  it  left  you  feeling  that  something  beautiful 
had  passed  that  way,  something  more  beautiful  than 
anything  else,  like  the  rising  and  setting  of  stars. 
Every  possible  criticism  might  have  been  made  on 
it,  except  that  it  was  not  noble.  There  was  a  tone 
in  it  that  awakened  all  elevating  associations.  He 
boggled,  he  lost  his  place,  he  had  to  put  on  his 
glasses;  but  it  was  as  if  a  creature  from  some  fairer 
world  had  lost  his  way  in  our  fogs,  and  it  was  our 
fault  and  not  his.  It  was  chaotic,  but  it  was  all 
such  stuff  as  stars  are  made  of,  and  you  could  not 
help  feeling  that  if  you  waited  awhile  all  that  was 
nebulous  would  be  hurled  into  planets,  and  would 
assume  the  mathematical  gravity  of  system.  All 
through  it  I  felt  something  in  me  that  cried,  '  Ha, 
ha !  to  the  sound  of  trumpets  ! ' 

On  the  9th  of  July,  1872,  Lowell  and  Mrs.  Lowell 
sailed  for  Europe,  without  any  plans,  as  he  himself 
says.  They  remained  abroad  two  years.  They 
landed  in  England,  but  early  in  the  winter  he  es 
tablished  himself,  for  six  months  as  it  proved,  in 
Paris.  They  were  in  a  nice  little  hotel  there,  where 


206  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

he  is  still  remembered  cordially,  —  the  Hotel  de 
France  et  Lorraine.  Here  they  lived  quietly  from 
November  to  the  next  summer. 

He  was  in  Paris  in  the  last  years  of  M.  Thiers. 
The  interests  of  politics  centred  on  the  relations 
between  President  Thiers  and  the  Commission  of 
Thirty,  —  long  since,  I  am  afraid,  forgotten  by  this 
reader.  Lowell  writes  of  Thiers' s  resignation,  which 
closed  his  long  career  of  public  life,  "  I  think  it  was 
the  egotism  of  Thiers  that  overset  him  rather  than 
any  policy  he  was  supposed  to  have." 

Of  this  sojourn  in  Paris  a  near  friend  of  his  gives 
me  the  following  pleasant  note  :  — 

"  In  the  little  office  of  the  Hotel  France  et  Lor 
raine,  Rue  de  Beaune,  Paris,  hangs  a  fairly  good 
likeness  of  James  Russell  Lowell,  a  large  photo 
graph,  I  think,  taken  some  years  before  his  death. 
It  is,  and  has  been  for  twenty  years  and  more,  the 
presiding  presence  of  the  little  sanctum  where 
Madame  and  Monsieur  sit  and  make  out  their  (very 
reasonable)  bills  and  count  their  gains.  The  hotel 
is  still  a  most  attractive  retreat  for  a  certain  class 
of  us,  who  like  quiet  and  comfort  without  display. 
Rue  de  Beaune  is  a  narrow  little  street  leading  off 
the  Quai  Voltaire,  which  runs  parallel  to  the  Seine. 
On  the  opposite  shore  of  the  river  are  the  fine 
buildings  of  the  Tuileries  and  the  Louvre ;  be 
tween  flows  the  steady  stream,  covered  with  little 
steamers,  pleasure-boats,  bateaux-mouches,  tugs.  The 
great  Pont-Royal  crosses  the  river,  very  near  Rue 
de  Beaune,  to  the  Rue  des  Pyramides  through  the 
gardens  of  the  Tuileries.  It  is  one  of  the  prettiest 


TWENTY  YEARS  OF  HARVARD  207 

though  not  the  gayest  parts  of  Paris.  The  bridge 
and  adjoining  streets  are  crowded  with  life  on  foot 
and  on  omnibus ;  but  take  one  step  into  Rue  de 
Beaune,  and  you  find  silence,  peace,  and  repose. 

"  In  the  winter  of  1872-73  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Low 
ell  were  living  at  this  modest  but  well-known  hotel, 
in  its  grandest  apartments  au  premier.  Somewhat 
dark  and  dingy  even  then,  more  so  now,  but  neat 
and  comfortable.  The  house  must  be  very  old.  It 
is  built  round  a  little  cour,  or  rather  two  little 
courts ;  and  a  winding  staircase  leads  up  through 
the  principal  part  to  the  landings  of  the  several 
stories.  There  were  two  parlors,  if  I  remember, 
communicating.  The  walls  were  lined  with  book 
cases,  filled  with  Mr.  Lowell's  books,  and  other 
furniture  of  the  cosy,  comfortable  order,  when  they 
established  themselves  in  these  congenial  quarters. 

"Here  they  lived,  read,  wrote,  talked,  enjoyed 
themselves.  Mr.  Lowell  was  probably  writing  some 
thing  of  importance,  but  he  had  at  that  time  no 
public  or  official  business,  no  pressing  engagements. 
He  was,  in  fact,  doing  just  what  he  pleased  all  the 
time.  Of  course  his  acquaintance  was  large  in  the 
American  colony  and  among  the  best  French  so 
ciety  of  Paris,  but  I  do  not  think  he  troubled  him 
self  about  it  much.  He  delighted  in  prowling 
about  the  book-stalls  which  abound  in  the  Quai 
Voltaire,  where  old  rubbish  in  print  is  displayed 
along  the  parapet  of  the  river  in  tempting  openness, 
and  where  a  real  book-worm  may  rummage  and  find 
something  really  valuable  among  apparently  hope 
less  stuff.  He  loved  a  quiet  little  dinner  (in  their 


210  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

dispatch  in  the  "  Times  "  was  confined  to  the  for 
tunes  of  some  wretched  Modoc  Indians  in  Califor 
nia,  who  were  hiding  among  their  rocks  and  were 
being  killed  one  by  one  by  sharpshooters.  For  the 
rest  there  was  practically  nothing,  —  nothing  which 
showed  me  that  brave  boys  were  growing  into  brave 
men,  that  good  girls  were  growing  into  pure  women, 
that  universities  and  libraries  and  Chautauquas  and 
summer  schools  were  giving  a  liberal  education  to 
half  my  country,  that  merchants  were  telling  the 
truth  and  acting  the  truth,  and  inventors  were  re 
newing  the  world. 

I  go  a  little  out  of  the  way  to  say  this,  because 
I  observe  that  Mr.  A.  Lawrence  Lowell,  in  his 
admirable  notice  of  his  cousin's  life,  suggests  that 
his  stay  in  Europe  in  1872-73  to  a  certain  extent 
modified  his  notion  with  regard  to  America  and 
American  politics.  Mr.  A.  Lawrence  Lowell  uses 
the  following  words  :  — 

"  During  his  stay  in  Europe  Lowell  had  been  dis 
tressed  at  the  condition  of  politics  in  this  country, 
and  annoyed  at  the  expressions  of  contempt  for 
America  it  had  called  forth  on  the  other  side  of  the 
Atlantico  On  his  return  he  was  horrified  by  the 
lack  of  indignation  at  corruption  in  public  life,  for 
the  intense  party  feeling  engendered  by  the  war 
was  still  too  strong  to  permit  independent  judgment 
in  politics.  He  expressed  his  disgust  in  a  couple  of 
poems  in  <  The  Nation,'  called  '  The  World's  Fair ' 
and  '  Tempora  Mutantur.'  The  verses  were  not 
of  a  high  order  of  poetry,  and  at  first  one  regrets 
that  Hosea  Biglow  did  not  come  out  once  more  to 


THK    HALL,    ELM  WOOD 


TWENTY  YEARS  OF  HARVARD  211 

do  battle  with  the  spoils  system,  as  he  had  with 
the  slave  power  long  ago;  but  the  subject  was 
not  one  that  made  it  possible.  Among  the  archaic 
sculptures  buried  on  the  Acropolis  after  the  sack 
of  Athens  by  Xerxes,  and  recently  unearthed,  is  a 
fragment  of  a  pediment  representing  Hercules  and 
the  Hydra.  The  hero  is  on  all  fours  alongside  the 
monster  in  a  cave,  a  fitting  type  of  the  way  political 
corruption  must  be  fought  at  the  present  day.  The 
war  with  slavery,  like  that  of  Perseus  with  the 
dragon,  could  be  waged  on  wings  with  a  flashing 
sword ;  but  the  modern  reformer  must  go  down  on 
his  hands  and  knees  and  struggle  with  reptiles  in 
the  dark." 

Whether  Lowell  were  right  or  wrong  in  thinking 
that  a  new  wave  of  Philistinism  had  overwhelmed 
the  administration  of  America  is  of  no  great  im 
portance  to  us  here.  I  think  he  was  wrong.  I 
think  that  the  American  people  govern  America, 
and  that  the  intrigues  or  devices  of  the  men  who 
"  run  with  the  machine  "  are  of  much  less  importance 
than  very  young  people  suppose,  who  read  very  poor 
though  very  conceited  weekly  newspapers.  How 
ever  that  may  be,  this  country  has  received  great  ad 
vantage  from  Lowell's  determined  interference  and 
interaction  in  our  politics  in  the  years  which  followed 
his  return  in  1874.  So  vigorous  were  his  writings 
that  he  was  at  once  recognized  as  a  pure  public 
leader.  I  have  always  found  that  the  "  machine  " 
is  eager  to  join  hands  with  any  man  of  literary, 
inventive,  or  business  ability  who  is  willing,  as  the 
phrase  is,  to  "  go  into  politics."  Certainly  this  was 


212  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

so  in  Lowell's  case,  and  in  the  autumn  of  1876  he 
was  asked  to  take  a  seat  in  Congress  which  we  call 
in  Massachusetts  the  South  Middlesex  seat.  It  was 
the  seat  which  Edward  Everett  had  captured  years 
before,  in  the  face  of  the  machine  of  his  time.  It 
was  the  seat  which  William  Everett  afterwards  cap 
tured,  by  fine  audacity,  although  he  was  not  even  a 
resident  in  the  district.  Lowell  might  have  gone 
to  the  Congress  of  1877  if  he  had  chosen.  He  de 
clined  the  position,  estimating  correctly  his  abilities 
and  inabilities  as  a  member  of  a  legislative  body, 
"  as  it  seems  to  me."  But,  with  the  same  desire  to 
show  that  men  of  character  and  ability  were  inter 
ested  in  the  Republican  party,  the  nominating  con 
vention  made  him  an  elector  for  the  presidency. 

It  was  in  the  famous  election  after  which  Hayes 
was  declared  to  be  President  by  the  electoral  com 
mission.  I  will  say  in  passing  that,  as  acting  presi 
dent  of  the  New  England  Emigrant  Aid  Company, 
it  had  been  my  business  to  see  to  the  transfer  of 
two  or  three  thousand  voters  from  the  North  into 
Florida  in  the  years  after  the  rebellion,  and  that  it 
was  no  matter  of  surprise  to  me,  therefore,  that  the 
electoral  commission  pronounced  that  Florida  had 
given  a  Republican  vote.  I  believe  Florida  would 
give  such  a  vote  to-day,  if  there  were  any  chance  of 
its  being  counted. 

When  it  was  clear  that  the  election  of  Mr.  Hayes 
would  depend  on  a  single  ballot  in  the  electoral 
college,  there  were  intriguers  so  mean  as  to  suggest 
that  possibly  Mr.  Lowell  might  be  persuaded  —  I 
suppose  by  considerations  which  such  men  under- 


TWENTY  YEARS  OF  HARVARD  213 

stand  better  than  I  do  —  to  give  a  vote  for  Mr. 
Tilden.  Any  such  hopes  as  these  Mr.  Lowell  very 
promptly  suppressed,  as  such  a  man  can.  That  lit 
tle  correspondence,  however,  called  attention  to  his 
name,  even  in  the  somewhat  dark  council  chambers 
of  the  people  who  distrust  "  them  littery  fellers." 

Fortunately  for  America  also,  in  all  turns  of  our 
politics  there  has  been  the  same  sense  of  the  value 
of  literature  and  of  the  sphere  of  men  of  letters 
which  has  given  the  world  about  all  the  good  diplo 
macy  which  the  world  has  ever  had.  Somewhat  as 
Franklin  was  sent  to  France  because  the  French 
had  heard  of  him  before,  quite  as  Motley  was  sent 
to  Vienna  because  he  knew  something  about  history 
and  could  speak  the  language  of  Germany,  exactly 
as  Mr.  Irving  had  been  sent  to  Spain  as  our  minis 
ter,  the  new  administration  made  advances  to  Mr. 
Lowell  to  ask  him  if  he  would  not  represent  us  at 
one  of  the  European  courts. 

The  following  notes  may  be  published  now,  for 
the  study  of  annalists,  as  most  of  the  people  who 
are  referred  to  are  dead  :  — 

(April  13,  1876.)  "  What  I  meant  to  say  was 
that  if,  when  the  Russian  embassy  was  offered  me, 
it  had  been  the  English  instead,  I  should  have  hesi 
tated  before  saying  no.  But  with  the  salary  cut 
down  as  it  is  now,  I  could  n't  afford  to  take  it,  for 
I  could  not  support  it  decently." 

(April  19,  1876.)  "I  return  Mr.  Fish's  letter. 
There  is  no  more  chance  of  their  sending  me  to  St. 
James's  than  to  the  moon,  though  I  might  not  be 
unwilling  to  go.  On  the  old  salary  I  might  manage, 


214  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

and  it  might  do  my  health  good.  I  have  little  doubt 
that  it  was  offered  to  L.  with  the  understanding 
that  he  would  decline.  I  have  not  seen  him  for  a 
few  days.  But  it  is  too  large  a  plum  for  anybody 
not  '  inside  politics/  It  is  the  only  mission  where 
the  vernacular  sufficeth.  Meanwhile,  you  will  be 
amused  to  hear  that  I  am  getting  inside  politics  after 
a  fashion.  I  shall  probably  head  the  delegation 
from  our  ward  to  the  state  convention." 

Four  foreign  missions  were  offered  him.  He 
declined  all,  but  in  declining  said,  perhaps  without 
much  thought,  that  if  they  had  offered  him  the 
mission  to  Spain,  he  would  have  gone.  Mr.  Evarts 
was  Secretary  of  State,  and  it  may  readily  be  ima 
gined  that  he  was  able  "  to  manage  it."  And  so  it 
was  that  this  professor  in  Harvard  College,  who  had 
kept  his  eyes  so  far  open  that  he  knew  of  the  exist 
ence  of  Abraham  Lincoln  in  1860,  was  appointed  to 
represent  the  United  States  in  Spain. 


CHAPTER  XIII 

MR.    LOWELL    IN    SPAIN 

THE  reader  ought  to  understand  that  while  the 
Spanish  mission  has  always  been  spoken  of  by 
uninformed  people  as  a  somewhat  lazy  corner  in 
that  somewhat  old-fashioned  salon  which  takes  'the 
name  of  "  Diplomacy/'  the  United  States  minister 
in  Spain  has  always  been  walking  amidst  hot  coals, 
or  explosive  friction  matches.  Some  drowsy  people, 
whose  principal  business  in  life  has  been  to  cut  off 
the  coupons  from  securities  which  other  people  had 
earned  for  them,  waked  up  with  surprise  when  they 
learned  that  this  country  had  at  last  taken  up  the 
gauntlet  of  war.  The  United  States  meant  to  finish 
the  job  which  Drake  and  Burleigh  and  Howard  and 
Elizabeth  left  unfinished  three  centuries  ago.  But 
other  people  were  not  surprised.  If  they  have 
cared  about  the  history  of  the  hundred  years  which 
have  made  the  United  States  a  nation,  —  and  which 
have  seen  ten  or  twelve  changes  either  of  constitu 
tion  or  of  dynasty  in  Spain,  —  men  have  known  that 
open  questions,  some  of  them  of  great  seriousness, 
have  all  the  time  entangled  the  diplomatic  web 
which  was  woven  between  the  two  nations. 

Into  the  heritage  of  these  complications  Lowell 
came  when  —  in  a  pacific  time  —  he  presented  his 


216  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

credentials  at  Madrid.  The  sovereign  then  on  the 
throne  was  Alfonso  XII.,  and  one  of  Lowell's  earli 
est  dispatches  describes  the  ceremonies  attending 
his  marriage  with  Mercedes,  the  young  princess. 
The  minister  of  foreign  affairs  was  Don  Fernando 
Calderon  Collantes.  The  short-lived  republic  which 
began  in  1873,  on  the  abdication  of  Amadeo  of 
Savoy,  had,  in  its  time,  given  way,  and  the  old 
Bourbon  family  had  returned  in  the  person  of 
Alfonso  XII. 

In  the  short  period  of  the  republic  I  happened 
to  be  editing  the  magazine  called  "  Old  and  New," 
in  Boston.  Like  most  intelligent  Americans,  I 
hoped  to  see  republican  government  extend  itself  in 
Europe. 

I  wanted,  at  all  events,  that  our  readers  should 
know  the  truth  about  it.  I  struck  high,  as  an  edi 
tor  always  should  do.  So  I  waited  on  Charles 
Francis  Adams,  the  same  who  had  carried  through 
our  negotiations  with  England  in  the  civil  war  with 
such  masterly  success.  If  there  ever  were  a  Repub 
lican  and  Democrat,  it  was  he ;  if  there  ever  were  a 
person  confident  in  the  strength  of  America,  it  was 
he ;  and  I  certainly  expected  his  sympathy  in  the 
cause  of  the  new-born  Spanish  republic. 

I  asked  him  to  write  our  article  on  Spain  and 
the  new  republic.  He  listened  to  me  with  all  his 
perfect  courtesy ;  and  then  he  advised  me  —  I 
might  say  he  bade  me  —  take  no  stock  in  the  enter 
prise.  I  pressed  him ;  I  said,  "  Surely,  we  want  to 
extend  republican  institutions  in  Europe  ?  "  And 
he  smiled,  sadly  enough,  and  said,  "  Do  not  expect 


MR.  LOWELL  IN  SPAIN  217 

anything  of  Spain,  Mr.  Hale.  The  truth  is  not  in 
them." 

In  this  old  Bible  axiom  of  Covenanters  and  of 
Puritans  is  the  secret  of  all  the  difficulties  between 
England  and  Spain  in  Drake's  time,  between  this 
country  and  Spain  in  Jefferson's  day,  and  in  each 
of  the  crises  of  negotiation  since.  Spain  and  her 
statesmen  really  think  that  a  lie  well  stuck  to  is  as 
good  as  the  truth.  Our  representatives  do  not  think 
so.  The  difference  makes  a  jar  when  the  neophyte 
in  diplomacy  discovers  it. 

In  the  unpublished  "  Pickering  correspondence  " 
are  some  curious  memoranda  which  show  what  Jef- 
erson  thought  and  planned.  Jefferson  had  seen  the 
real  Philip  Nolan  killed,  and  nine  American  compan 
ions  of  his  kept  in  lifelong  imprisonment  in  Mexico 
because  the  Spanish  government  violated  its  own 
passports.  This  all  began  as  early  as  1801.  In 
1825  Mr.  Alexander  Everett,  our  minister  in  Spain, 
offered  the  Spanish  government  one  hundred  mil 
lions  for  Cuba.  Under  Mr.  Polk's  government, 
twenty  years  after,  the  offer  was  renewed.  Mr. 
Soule,  our  minister  in  Madrid  between  1853  and 
1855,  complicated  matters  by  his  personal  quarrels. 
He  fought  a  duel  with  Turgot,  the  French  min 
ister,  and  incurred  the  dislike,  naturally  enough, 
of  the  French  government.  At  a  conference  of 
three  American  foreign  ministers  at  Ostend  in  1854, 
Buchanan,  Mason,  and  himself,  Soule  pressed  the 
importance  of  the  annexation  of  Cuba  to  the  United 
States,  and  carried  with  him  both  of  his  coadjutors. 

But  it  is  not  at  all  necessary  that  we  should  enter 


218  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

into  the  details  of  these  complications.  The  history 
of  all  this  diplomacy  has  been  admirably  written  by 
Professor  Hart,  and  is  published  in  "  Harper's  Maga 
zine  "  of  June,  1898.  We  should  probably  have 
gone  to  war  with  Spain  at  Mr.  Soule's  suggestion, 
but  that  at  that  moment,  in  1854  and  1855,  the 
weak  government  of  that  weakest  of  men,  Franklin 
Pierce,  was  in  very  hot  water  at  home.  The  ad 
ministration  had  offended  the  whole  North  by  its 
operations  in  Kansas,  and  it  was  no  time  to  ask  for 
a  war  which  seemed  likely  to  end  in  the  annexation 
of  another  slave  State  to  the  Union.  Mr.  Soule 
was  recalled,  and  some  sort  of  modus  Vivendi  was 
patched  up  which  carried  us  through  the  civil  war. 
Mr.  Lincoln  appointed  Mr.  Koerner  as  our  minister 
in  Spain,  who  was  succeeded  by  Mr.  John  Parker 
Hale. 

One  is  glad  to  say  that  at  this  time  the  drift 
of  the  somewhat  wayward  movements  of  Spanish 
administration  was  in  our  favor.  A  curious  little 
anecdote,  which  I  think  has  never  been  printed, 
illustrates  this ;  and  as  it  has  an  indirect  bearing  on 
after  diplomacy,  I  will  repeat  it  here.  After  our 
civil  war  had  ground  along  for  nearly  three  years, 
Louis  Napoleon,  as  will  be  remembered,  took  a  hand 
in  it.  He  formed  the  ingenious  plan  of  uniting 
other  nations  in  a  change  of  the  international  law 
governing  blockades.  The  admiralty  law  of  the 
world  at  present  extends  the  jurisdiction  of  any 
nation  for  one  marine  league  from  its  shores.  If, 
therefore,  a  blockade-runner  could  get  within  three 
miles  of  Jamaica,  Cuba,  or  Porto  Kico,  he  was  safe 


MR.  LOWELL  IN  SPAIN  219 

from  any  interference  from  our  blockading  fleet. 
Napoleon  ingeniously  proposed  that,  instead  of  one 
league,  this  limit  of  local  sovereignty  should  be  ex 
tended  to  three  leagues  from  shore.  He  knew  well 
enough  that  England  would  never  consent  to  this 
change ;  but  he  had  that  audacity  which  enabled 
him  to  persuade  the  Spanish  minister  to  come  into 
his  plan. 

Maps  of  the  West  Indies  are  now  plenty,  and  any 
reader  who  will  look  at  the  position  of  Cuba,  Porto 
Kico,  and  the  little  French  islands  in  the  West 
Indies  will  see  how  seriously  such  an  extension  of  a 
neutral  limit  would  have  hindered  the  operations 
of  our  blockading  fleets.  All  this  negotiation  was 
conducted  with  great  secrecy,  and  orders  were  sent 
from  Spain  to  the  West  Indies,  instructing  the  local 
authorities  there  to  extend  threefold  the  range  of 
their  dominion  over  the  sea.  These  orders  had 
already  gone  when  Mr.  Horatio  Perry,  our  secretary 
of  legation  at  that  time,  got  wind  of  this  treachery 
of  our  ally. 

What  Mr.  Perry  did  in  this  issue  was  wise.  He 
told  his  wife.  She  went  immediately  and  told  the 
Duchess  of  Montpensier,  who  had  none  too  great 
love  of  Louis  Napoleon,  "  the  nephew  of  his  uncle," 
and  the  occupant  of  Louis  Philippe's  throne.  She 
told  her  sister,  the  queen.  The  queen  sent  at  once 
for  Mr.  Perry. 

He  told  her  what  the  emperor  had  done,  and 
what  her  own  ministers  had  done.  I  suppose  he 
said,  "  You  are  injuring  your  best  friends,  —  at  the 
solicitation  of  this  intriguer,  whom  you  hate,  and 


220  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

who  is  your  worst  enemy."  The  queen  said  this 
was  the  first  she  had  heard  of  the  matter,  and  she 
would  send  for  her  prime  minister. 

So  she  did.  And  he  came.  And  she  asked  him 
if  this  thing  had  been  done.  And  he  confessed  that 
it  had ;  Her  Majesty  had  signed  the  order  on  such 
or  such  a  day. 

"  But  no  one  told  me  what  it  meant,"  said  poor 
Isabella.  "  No  one  told  me  that  this  was  a  heavy 
blow  to  my  American  allies." 

No.  No  one  had  told  her.  The  minister  ex 
plained  that  as  well  as  he  could.  If  Her  Majesty 
disliked  it,  he  was  sorry,  but  he  was  too  late  to  help 
it.  Why  too  late?  the  queen  asked.  Because  a 
steamer  had  gone  to  the  West  Indian  fleet  with  the 
orders  which  changed  one  league  to  three  leagues. 

Then  Queen  Isabella  spoke  the  words  which,  as  I 
count  it,  were  the  best  words  of  her  life  :  — 

"  It  is  not  too  late  for  me  to  accept  your  resigna 
tions." 

And  when  it  came  to  that,  it  proved  that  the 
Senor  Don  did  not  want  to  resign,  and  the  other 
Senores  Dons  did  not  want  to  resign,  and  they 
found  a  fast  steamer  to  take  out  orders  rescinding 
the  other  orders.  And  so  the  Emperor  Napoleon 
got  a  slap  in  his  face,  and  so  the  blockade  was  main 
tained  for  the  next  year. 

And  so  Spain  scored  one  on  her  private  account 
with  the  Washington  government,  and  Isabella  II. 
found  one  decent  thing  on  the  credit  side  when  she 
stood  at  the  bar  of  St.  Peter  or  history. 

Whoever  will  refer  to  the  published  state  papers 


MR.  LOWELL  IN  SPAIN  221 

will  find  no  reference  to  this  interesting  incident. 
It  is  the  sort  of  thing  they  leave  out  in  printing. 
But  you  can  see  that  it  must  have  taken  place  in  the 
autumn  of  1863,  if  you  will  read  between  the  lines. 

As  I  have  said,  the  intelligent  reader  of  these  lines 
has  read  Professor  Hart's  admirable  review  of  the 
diplomacy  of  the  United  States  and  Spain  regarding 
Cuba  for  a  hundred  years  ;  or,  if  he  has  not  read  it, 
he  had  better  read  it  as  soon  as  he  can  find  the 
"  Harper's  "  for  June,  1898.  He  will  learn  that  in 
that  century  there  were  but  two  cases  of  direct  in 
terference  with  the  destinies  of  Cuba,  one  by  Presi 
dent  John  Quincy  Adams  in  1826,  and  one  by  Pre 
sident  Grant  in  1875.  At  the  same  time  he  will 
find  that  there  were  filibusters  in  1849,  1851,  again 
in  the  years  1868-78,  again  in  1884-85,  when  the 
American  administration  gave  these  filibusters  nei 
ther  aid  nor  comfort.  In  1854  and  1873  there  came 
reasons  for  war,  and  they  were  not  regarded.  Sim 
ply,  these  references  to  events  of  the  utmost  impor 
tance  will  show  the  reader  what  were  the  traditions 
of  our  legation  in  Madrid  when  Mr.  Lowell  arrived 
there,  in  August  of  1877. 

I  must  have  talked  with  him  about  the  Spanish 
politics  of  his  time,  for  I  saw  him  often  in  London, 
just  before  I  visited  Spain  in  1882,  and  I  traveled 
there  with  the  benefit  of  his  instructions.  But  I 
kept  no  notes  of  what  he  said,  and  I  dare  not  refer 
any  of  my  own  impressions  directly  to  him.  For 
myself  in  Spain  I  had  only  the  poor  chance  which  a 
traveler  of  forty  days  has  to  learn  from  the  daily 
newspapers,  from  table-d'hote  talk,  and  from  inter- 


222  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

views,  too  short,  with  intelligent  men  of  all  parties 
and  professions. 

I  conceived  a  very  high  respect  for  the  rank 
and  file  of  the  Spanish  people.  Ignorant  ?  Yes,  if 
reading  and  writing  are  the  tests  of  ignorance,  for 
only  one  fifth  of  the  population  can  read  their  own 
language.  But  the  people  themselves,  the  average 
people,  as  I  saw  them,  seemed  to  me  a  very  civil, 
friendly,  self-respecting,  thoughtful,  and  industrious 
people.  They  were  ready  to  oblige  a  stranger,  and 
they  did  not  expect  a  penny  or  a  shilling,  as  an 
Englishman  or  an  Irishman  does  when  he  has  obliged 
a  stranger. 

I  see  that  careful  students  of  the  position  now 
say  that  the  class  of  people  in  administration  in 
Spain,  the  people  who  make  and  unmake  ministries 
and  dynasties,  are  more  absolutely  separate  from 
what  I  call  the  rank  and  file  than  anywhere  else  in 
the  world.  I  had  a  suspicion  of  this  when  I  was  in 
Spain. 

At  the  same  time  I  observed  that  the  circulation 
of  the  daily  newspapers  in  Madrid  was  as  great  as 
is  that  of  the  papers  in  Boston,  the  two  cities  being 
near  the  same  size.  They  were  bitter  and  violent  in 
their  satire  and  in  their  attacks  on  each  other.  I 
think  there  were  three  bright  and  well-illustrated 
comic  dailies,  each  with  a  large  colored  cartoon. 
Here,  I  think,  was  the  tribute  to  the  people  who 
could  not  read.  I  suppose  that  the  proportion  of 
people  who  can  read  is  much  larger  in  Madrid  than 
in  the  whole  nation. 

Sagasta  was  at  the  helm  in  1882,  as  he  is  in  1898. 


MR.  LOWELL  IN  SPAIN  223 

I  find  that  I  wrote  of  him  then,  "  If  you  trusted  the 
newspapers,  you  would  say  that  there  is  only  one 
man  in  Spain,  or  possibly  two,  who  wanted  Sagasta 
to  stay  in,  —  that  this  one  was  Sagasta  himself,  — 
that  the  other  was  possibly  his  confidential  private 
secretary.  You  would  say  that  everybody  else  was 
wild  to  have  such  an  absurd  pretender  pushed  from 
his  throne,  and  every  morning  you  would  be  sure 
that  he  would  fall  before  the  next  day,  and  would 
be  at  once  forgotten." 

But  at  the  same  time  I  wrote,  "  As  it  seems  to 
me,  Sagasta  is  one  of  the  ablest  men  in  Europe,  and 
I  think  the  king  has  as  high  an  opinion  of  Sagasta 
as  any  of  us  can  form.  .  .  .  And  I  think  the  king 
is  a  remarkable  young  man,  and  that  if  he  can  hold 
on  for  five  years  longer,  as  he  has  for  the  last  eight, 
he  will  be  counted  not  only  as  one  of  the  wisest 
sovereigns  in  Europe,  but  as  one  of  the  wisest  of  the 
nineteenth  century." 

This,  so  far  as  the  young  king  goes,  is  very 
strong;  it  now  seems  absurd.  But  one  hopes  so 
much  from  young  kings !  and  this  fine  fellow  — 
he  was  that  at  least  —  died  when  he  was  not  thirty- 
one.  The  first  story  any  one  told  you  of  him,  when 
I  was  in  Spain,  was  this  :  that  when  he  was  asked 
to  take  the  crown,  after  the  republic  of  Castelar 
had  broken  down,  he  said,  "  Yes,  I  will  come  if  you 
wish.  Only,  when  you  want  me  to  go,  tell  me  so, 
and  I  will  go.  Kemember,  all  along,  that  I  am  the 
first  republican  in  Europe." 

Of  the  young  king,  Lowell  himself  gives  his  opin 
ion  in  this  anecdote  :  — 


224  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

"  On  Saturday,  the  26th  [of  October,  1878],  the 
king  received  the  felicitations  of  the  diplomatic 
body.  Among  other  things,  he  said  to  me,  '  I  al 
most  wish  he  had  hit  me,  I  am  so  tired.'  Indeed, 
his  position  is  a  trying  one,  and  I  feel  sure  that  if 
he  were  allowed  more  freely  to  follow  his  own  im 
pulses  and  to  break  through  the  hedge  of  etiquette 
which  the  conservative  wing  of  the  restoration  have 
planted  between  him  and  his  people,  his  natural 
qualities  of  character  and  temperament  would  make 
him  popular." 

To  us  in  America  it  is  interesting  to  remember 
that  in  the  court  of  this  young  king,  who  made  so 
favorable  an  impression  in  his  short  reign  of  eleven 
years,  was  one  whom  we  may  call  an  American  lady. 
That  is  to  say,  Madam  Calderon,  to  whom  the  im 
portant  charge  of  the  education  of  his  sisters  was 
intrusted,  was  the  wife  and  afterward  the  widow 
of  Calderon  de  la  Barca,  a  distinguished  Spanish 
diplomatist.  She  was  Miss  Fanny  Inglis,  born  in 
Scotland,  the  granddaughter  of  Colonel  Gardner,  of 
Preston  Pans.  In  her  youth  she  removed  to  Boston 
with  her  sister,  Mrs.  McLeod,  and  there  was  a  teacher 
in  her  sister's  school.  She  was  a  very  brilliant,  con 
scientious,  and  agreeable  person,  and  as  the  wife  of 
Calderon  de  la  Barca  when  he  was  Spanish  minister 
to  the  United  States,  and  afterwards  in  Mexico, 
made,  as  she  deserved,  a  wide  circle  of  friends.  She 
had  the  charge  of  this  prince  as  soon  as  he  needed  a 
governess,  and  of  his  sisters.  The  Spanish  govern 
ment  showed  its  appreciation  of  her  services  by 
presenting  to  her  a  beautiful  home,  above  the  Al- 


MK.  LOWELL  IN  SPAIN  225 

hambra,  in  Granada,  where  many  of  her  old  Ameri 
can  friends  subsequently  visited  her.  She  died  in  the 
royal  palace  at  Madrid,  in  the  winter  of  1881-82. 

Of  our  legation  in  Madrid  Lowell  himself  says, 
in  a  private  note,  that  the  secretary  of  legation 
whom  he  found  there  says  that  it  is  the  hardest- 
worked  legation  in  Europe. 

I  myself  have  known  personally  five  or  six 
gentlemen  who  have  held  the  position,  and  all  of 
them  have  given  me  the  same  impression.  I  re 
member  one  of  these  gentlemen  told  me  that  he  was 
still  at  work  on  a  claim  which  one  of  our  captains 
had  against  the  Spanish  government  for  interfer 
ence  with  his  vessel  ten  years  before.  The  manana 
policy  had  dragged  the  thing  along  so  far.  So 
that  in  that  legation  one  had  to  keep  in  mind  the 
history  of  half  a  dozen  Spanish  dynasties. 

At  this  moment,  writing  when  we  are  in  war 
with  Spain  and  the  plaza  of  Santiago  de  Cuba  is 
again  historical,  it  is  impossible  not  to  go  back  a 
quarter  of  a  century.  At  that  time  the  governor 
of  Santiago  shot,  without  trial,  in  that  plaza,  fifty- 
four  men,  most  of  them  American  citizens.  They 
had  been  captured  in  the  Virginius,  a  filibustering 
steamer;  but  according  to  any  law  of  any  nation 
which  pretended  to  any  civilization,  they  deserved 
and  should  have  received  trial.  It  was  then  that 
Mr.  Fish  sent  to  Mr.  Sickles,  our  minister  in  Spain, 
the  dispatch  to  which  I  have  referred,  "If  Spain 
cannot  redress  these  outrages,  the  United  States 
will." 

Why  was  Spain  let  off  then  ?     It  seems  such  a 


226  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

pity  now.  A  short  shrift  then  would  have  saved 
two  or  three  hundred  thousand  lives  which  have 
been  lost  in  the  barbarism  of  Spanish  administra 
tion  since.  Whoever  will  read  the  complicated 
correspondence  of  that  year  will  see  that  General 
Grant  exercised  the  utmost  forbearance.  Spain 
was  at  that  moment  a  republic :  what  American 
wanted  to  crush  a  poor  little  European  republic 
which  could  hardly  hold  its  head  above  water? 
The  gentlemen  in  authority  in  Madrid  descended  to 
the  most  pathetic  petitions  that  they  might  be  ex 
cused,  —  if  only  this  time  we  would  let  them  off 
from  what  they  deserved,  no  such  barbarism  should 
ever  be  tolerated  again.  The  minister  of  foreign 
affairs  would  come  over  himself  to  the  American 
legation  to  plead  a  postponement  of  justice.  At 
the  end  Spain  promised  to  pension  the  families  of 
the  people  her  viceroy  had  murdered.  So  General 
Grant  gave  way,  and  when,  four  years  after,  Mr. 
Lowell  arrived,  it  was  his  duty  to  show  that  we  had 
forgiven,  and  were  trying  to  forget. 

Of  the  foreign  dispatches  from  our  ministers,  our 
government  means  to  print  only  that  which  is 
wholly  harmless  in  future  diplomacy.  There  is, 
therefore,  but  little  of  Lowell's  in  print  which  bears 
upon  the  questions  most  interesting  now.  But 
once  and  again  he  says  that,  when  the  Spanish 
government  had  paid  something  which  it  owed,  the 
foreign  minister  would  beg  that  notice  might  be 
taken  of  it,  as  showing  their  friendly  wish  to  do 
their  duty  when  they  could. 

Here   is  a  little   scrap,  unimportant   enough   in 


MR.   LOWELL  IN  SPAIN  227 

itself,  but  fairly  pathetic  now  in  its  open  confession 
by  a  Spanish  minister  of  the  power  for  reserve  or  de 
ception  which  such  a  minister  has  —  or  thinks  he  has. 

In  inclosing  it  Lowell  says  :  — 

(April  2,  1878.)  "  The  interpellation  of  General 
Salamanca  may  either  indicate  that  there  is  some 
doubt  in  the  mind  of  the  party  to  which  he  belongs 
as  to  the  complete  pacification  of  Cuba,  or  that  he 
thought  it  a  good  topic  about  which  to  ask  a  ques 
tion  that  might  be  embarrassing  to  the  ministry. 
The  answer  of  Senor  Canovas  admits,  as  you  will 
see,  that  armed  resistance  still  exists,  and  seems  to 
imply  even  more  than  it  admits.  I  am  not  sure 
that  it  would  be  safe  to  draw  any  inference  from 
this,  as  Senor  Canovas  has,  from  the  first,  shown 
great  discretion  and  reserve  with  regard  to  the 
recent  events  and  Cuba."  .  .  . 

(Inclosure.)  "Senor  Canovas.  .  .  .  For  the  rest, 
the  government,  in  fact,  knows  concerning  the  in 
ternal  condition  of  Cuba,  concerning  the  prelimi 
naries  of  capitulation,  and  concerning  other  points, 
more  than  it  has  hitherto  had  occasion  to  lay  before 
the  members  of  this  body.  But  this  is  not  what  I 
said  before ;  I  did  not  say  that  the  government  had 
not  more  information  on  this  than  it  had  communi 
cated  to  Congress,  for  if  that  were  the  case,  I  should 
not  have  had  occasion  to  suggest  what  I  have  sug 
gested.  .  .  .  Concerning  what  preceded  the  capitu 
lation,  concerning  the  capitulation  itself,  concerning 
what  the  government  expects  after  the  capitulation, 
concerning  what  it  believes  will  result  from  the 
capitulation,  concerning  the  possible  length  of  the 


228  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

war,  concerning  the  reasons  the  government  has 
for  hoping  what  it  may  hope  and  fearing  what  it 
may  fear,  —  the  government  has  its  own  knowledge, 
and  thinks  it  inopportune,  at  present,  to  enter  into 
discussion.  But  concerning  the  fact  of  the  forces 
which  have  submitted,  concerning  what  remains  to 
be  done  in  the  way  of  pacification,  the  government 
has  no  kind  of  secret." 

Senor  Canovas  was  the  minister  who  was  mur 
dered  last  year. 

With  such  cares,  and  in  such  difficult  surround 
ings,  Lowell  spent  the  close  of  1877  and  the  years 
1879  and  1880.  He  was  then  summoned,  very  un 
expectedly,  to  transfer  his  residence  to  London  as 
United  States  minister  to  England. 

In  the  mean  time,  with  his  astonishing  power  of 
work,  he  not  only  attended  curiously  well  to  the 
work  of  the  legation,  but  had  devoted  himself 
sedulously  to  the  study  of  the  Spanish  language 
and  literature.  His  private  letters  have  the  most 
amusing  and  interesting  references  to  such  studies. 
When  he  was  presented  to  the  king,  he  made  his 
speech  in  English,  the  king  answered  him  in  Span 
ish,  then  came  forward  and  exchanged  a  few  compli 
ments  in  French.  But  very  soon  it  appears  that 
he  was  determined  not  to  be  dependent  on  any  in 
terpreter,  or  on  the  accomplishment  of  any  of  the 
foreign  officers  with  whom  he  had  to  do.  "  I  am 
turned  schoolboy  again,  and  have  a  master  over  me 
once  more,  —  a  most  agreeable  man,  Don  Hermine- 
gildo  Giner  de  los  Bios,  who  comes  to  me  every 
morning  at  nine  o'clock  for  an  hour.  We  talk 


MR.  LOWELL  IN  SPAIN  229 

Spanish  together  (he  does  n't  understand  a  word  of 
English),  and  I  work  hard  at  translation  and  the 
like."  And  again  :  "  This  morning  I  wrote  a  note 
to  one  of  the  papers  here,  in  which  my  teacher 
found  only  a  single  word  to  change.  Was  n't  that 
pretty  well  for  a  boy  of  my  standing  ?  " 

This  he  writes  to  his  daughter  and  to  Miss  Nor 
ton  :  "  I  like  the  Spaniards,  and  find  much  that  is 
only  too  congenial  in  their  genius  for  to-morrow. 
I  am  working  now  at  Spanish  as  I  used  to  work 
at  Old  French,  —  that  is,  all  the  time,  and  with  all 
my  might.  I  mean  to  know  it  better  than  they  do 
themselves,  which  is  not  saying  much.  .  .  .  This  is 
the  course  of  my  day  :  get  up  at  eight ;  from  nine, 
sometimes  till  eleven,  my  Spanish  professor;  at 
eleven  breakfast,  at  twelve  to  the  legation,  at  three 
home  again  and  a  cup  of  chocolate,  then  read  the 
paper  and  write  Spanish  till  a  quarter  to  seven,  at 
seven  dinner,  and  at  eight  drive  in  an  open  carriage 
in  the  Prado  till  ten,  to  bed  twelve  to  one." 

He  writes  to  a  friend  in  1878  that  he  found  that 
the  minister  of  state  for  foreign  affairs  sometimes 
smoked  a  pipe  in  the  secrecy  of  home.  "  I  was  sure 
he  must  be  blistering  his  tongue  with  Spanish  mun- 
dungus,  and  sent  him  a  package  of  mine.  He  writes 
to  say,  '  It  is  the  best  I  ever  smoked  in  my  life ; 
I  had  no  idea  there  was  anything  so  good/  So  I 
sent  him  yesterday  ten  more  packages,  and  have 
promised  to  keep  his  pipe  full  for  so  long  as  I  am 
here." 

Of  his  own  work  in  his  vocation  as  diplomatist  he 
says :  "  I  am  beginning  to  feel  handier  in  my  new 


230  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

trade,  but  I  had  a  hard  row  to  hoe  at  first.  All 
alone,  without  a  human  being  I  had  ever  seen  before 
in  my  life,  and  with  unaccustomed  duties,  feeling  as 
if  I  were  beset  with  snares  on  every  hand,  obliged 
to  carry  on  the  greater  part  of  my  business  in  a 
strange  tongue,  it  was  rather  trying  for  a  man  with 
so  sympathetic  and  sensitive  a  temperament  as  mine, 
and  I  don't  much  wonder  the  gout  came  upon  me 
like  an  armed  man.  Three  attacks  in  five  months  ! 
But  now  I  begin  to  take  things  more  easily.  Still, 
I  don't  like  the  business  much,  and  feel  that  I  am 
wasting  my  time.  Nearly  all  I  have  to  do  neither 
enlists  my  sympathies  much  nor  makes  any  call  on 
my  better  faculties.  I  feel,  however,  as  if  I  were 
learning  something,  and  I  dare  say  I  shall  find  I 
have  when  I  get  back  to  my  own  chimney-corner 
again.  I  like  the  Spaniards,  with  whom  I  find  many 
natural  sympathies  in  my  own  nature,  and  who  have 
had  a  vast  deal  of  injustice  done  them  by  this  com* 
mercial  generation.  They  are  still  Orientals  to  a 
degree  one  has  to  live  among  them  to  believe.  But 
I  think  they  are  getting  on.  The  difficulty  is  that 
they  don't  care  about  many  things  that  we  are  fools 
enough  to  care  about,  and  the  balance  in  the  ledger 
is  not  so  entirely  satisfactory  to  them  as  a  standard 
of  morality  as  to  some  more  advanced  nations.  They 
employ  inferior  races  (as  the  Romans  did)  to  do 
their  intellectual  drudgery  for  them,  their  political 
economy,  scholarship,  history,  and  the  like.  But 
they  are  advancing  even  on  these  lines,  and  one  of 
these  days  —  But  I  won't  prophesy.  Suffice  it  that 
they  have  plenty  of  brains,  if  ever  they  should  con- 


MR.   LOWELL  IN  SPAIN  231 

descend  so  far  from  their  hidalguia  as  to  turn  them 
to  advantage.  They  get  a  good  deal  out  of  life  at 
a  cheap  rate,  and  are  not  far  from  wisdom,  if  the 
old  Greek  philosophers  who  used  to  be  held  up  to 
us  as  an  example  knew  anything  about  the  matter." 

It  must  have  been  a  joy  to  Mr.  Evarts,  in  the  De 
partment  of  State  at  home,  to  read  Lowell's  dis 
patches  when  they  came.  It  is  reserved  for  those 
who  have  the  inner  keys  to  the  inner  bureau  of  the 
department  to  read  them  all ;  but  here  are  some 
passages  which  have  been  printed  in  the  government 
reports,  —  because  harmless,  —  which  make  one  un 
derstand  why  he  was  sent  to  England  when  there 
was  a  vacancy  there  :  — 

(February  6,  1878.)  "  In  these  days  of  newspa 
per  enterprise,  when  everything  that  happens  ought 
to  happen,  or  might  have  happened  is  reported  by 
telegraph  to  all  quarters  of  the  world,  the  slow-going 
dispatch-bag  can  hardly  be  expected  to  bring  any 
thing  very  fresh  or  interesting  in  regard  to  a  public 
ceremonial  which,  though  intended  for  political 
effect,  had  little  political  significance.  The  next 
morning  frames  of  fireworks  are  not  inspiring,  un 
less  to  the  moralist ;  and  Madrid  is  already  quarrel 
ing  over  the  cost  and  mismanagement  of  a  show  for 
the  tickets  to  which  it  was  quarreling  a  week  ago." 

..."  Whoever  has  seen  the  breasts  of  the  pea 
santry  fringed  with  charms  older  than  Carthage  and 
relics  as  old  as  Rome,  and  those  of  the  upper  classes 
plastered  with  decorations,  will  not  expect  Spain  to 
become  conscious  of  the  nineteenth  century  and 
ready  to  welcome  it  in  a  day." 


232  JAMES   RUSSELL  LOWELL 

..."  A  nation  which  has  had  too  much  glory 
and  too  little  good  housekeeping."  .  .  . 

Here  is  the  pathetic  account  of  the  young  queen's 
death.  She  was  the  first  wife  of  Alfonso  XII. 
The  present  queen  regent  (the  Austrian)  is  the 
second :  — 

(July  3,  1878.)  "  Groups  gathered  and  talked  in 
undertone.  Ahout  the  palace  there  was  a  silent 
crowd  day  and  night,  and  there  could  be  no  ques 
tion  that  the  sorrow  was  universal  and  profound. 
On  the  last  day  I  was  at  the  palace  just  when  the 
poor  girl  was  dying.  As  I  crossed  the  great  inte 
rior  courtyard,  which  was  perfectly  empty,  I  was 
startled  by  a  dull  roar  not  unlike  that  of  vehicles  in 
a  great  city.  It  was  reverberated  and  multiplied  by 
the  huge  cavern  of  the  palace  court.  At  first  I 
could  see  nothing  that  accounted  for  it,  but  pre 
sently  found  that  the  arched  corridors  all  around 
the  square  were  filled,  both  on  the  ground  floor  and 
the  first  story,  with  an  anxious  crowd,  whose  eager 
questions  and  answers,  though  subdued  to  the  ut 
most,  produced  the  strange  thunder  I  had  heard. 
It  almost  seemed  for  a  moment  as  if  the  palace  itself 
had  become  vocal. 

..."  The  match  was  certainly  not  popular,  nor 
did  the  bride  call  forth  any  marks  of  public  sympa 
thy.  The  position  of  the  young  queen  was  difficult 
and  delicate,  demanding  more  than  common  tact  and 
discretion  to  make  it  even  tenable,  much  more  influ 
ential.  On  the  day  of  her  death  the  difference  was 
immense.  Sorrow  and  sympathy  were  in  every  heart 
and  on  every  face.  By  her  good  temper,  good 


MR.  LOWELL  IN  SPAIN  233 

sense,  and  womanly  virtues,  the  girl  of  seventeen 
had  not  only  endeared  herself  to  those  immediately 
about  her,  but  had  become  an  important  factor  in 
the  destiny  of  Spain.  I  know  very  well  what  divin 
ity  doth  hedge  royal  personages,  and  how  truly 
legendary  they  become  even  during  their  lives,  but 
it  is  no  exaggeration  to  say  that  she  had  made  her 
self  an  element  of  the  public  welfare,  and  that  her 
death  is  a  national  calamity.  Had  she  lived,  she 
would  have  given  stability  to  the  throne  of  her  hus 
band,  over  whom  her  influence  was  wholly  for  good. 
She  was  not  beautiful,  but  the  cordial  simplicity  of 
her  manner,  the  grace  of  her  bearing,  her  fine  eyes, 
and  the  youth  and  purity  of  her  face  gave  her  a 
charm  that  mere  beauty  never  attains." 

We  may  call  this  dispatch  the  first  version  of  his 
sonnet :  — 

DEATH  OF  QUEEN  MERCEDES. 

Hers  all  that  Earth  could  promise  or  bestow, 

Youth,  Beauty,  Love,  a  crown,  the  beckoning  years, 

Lids  never  wet,  unless  with  joyous  tears, 

A  life  remote  from  every  sordid  woe, 

And  by  a  nation's  swelled  to  lordlier  flow. 

What  lurking-place,  thought  we,  for  doubts  or  fears 

When,  the  day's  swan,  she  swam  along  the  cheers 

Of  the  Alcala,  five  happy  months  ago  ? 

The  guns  were  shouting  lo  Hymen  then 

That,  on  her  birthday,  now  denounce  her  doom  ; 

The  same  white  steeds  that  tossed  their  scorn  of  men 

To-day  as  proudly  drag  her  to  the  tomb. 

Grim  jest  of  fate  !     Yet  who  dare  call  it  blind, 

Knowing  what  life  is,  what  our  humankind  ? 

Early  in  1880  Lowell   received  unexpectedly  a 
request   from   the    Department   of    State   that   he 


234  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

would  represent  the  nation  in  England.  He  writes 
to  his  daughter  the  following  interesting  account  of 
his  transfer :  — 

"  Day  before  yesterday  I  was  startled  with  a  cipher 
telegram.  My  first  thought  was,  '  Row  in  Cuba  ! 
I  shall  have  no  end  of  bother  ! '  It  turned  out  to 
be  this  :  '  President  has  nominated  you  to  England 
[this  President  was  Hayes].  He  regards  it  as  essen 
tial  to  the  public  service  that  you  should  accept  and 
make  your  personal  arrangements  to  repair  to  Lon 
don  as  early  as  may  be.  Your  friends  whom  I  have 
conferred  with  concur  in  this  view.' ' 

Then  Mr.  Lowell  says  that  he  was  afraid  of  its 
effect  on  Mrs.  Lowell,  who  was  recovering  from  a 
long  and  desperate  illness;  but  she  was  pleased, 
and  began  to  contrive  how  he  might  accept.  He 
goes  on,  "  I  answered,  '  Feel  highly  honored  by 
President's  confidence.  Could  accept  if  allowed 
two  months'  delay.  Impossible  to  move  or  leave  my 
wife  sooner.'  ' 

When  I  was  in  Madrid  I  heard  this  story.  The 
two  months'  delay  did  not  prove  necessary.  Just  at 
this  juncture  poor  Mrs.  Lowell  was  confined  to  her 
bed,  and  had  been  for  some  time.  It  happened  that 
a  candle  set  fire  to  the  bed-curtains.  The  attend 
ants  fell  on  their  knees  to  implore  the  assistance  of 
the  Holy  Mother,  but  Mrs.  Lowell  sprang  up  and 
herself  took  the  direction  of  the  best  methods  for 
extinguishing  the  flames.  So  soon  as  nurses  and 
others  could  be  brought  into  shape,  it  proved  that 
the  adventure  had  not  been  an  injury  to  their  mis 
tress,  but  rather  an  advantage.  The  doctor  was 


MR.  LOWELL  IN  SPAIN  235 

summoned  at  once,  and  within  a  very  short  time 
was  able  to  say  that  Mrs.  Lowell  could  be  removed 
with  care  and  sent  by  steamer  to  England.  Mr. 
Lowell  was  said  to  have  telegraphed  at  once  to 
Washington  that  he  could  transfer  his  residence 
immediately,  as  he  was  asked  to  do.  Accordingly, 
by  a  well-contrived  and  convenient  arrangement, 
the  invalid  was  taken  by  rail  to  the  sea,  thence  by 
steamer  to  England,  and  arrived  there,  with  her 
husband,  with  no  unfavorable  results  to  her  health. 

In  this  sketch  of  Mr.  Lowell's  life  in  Madrid  I 
have  not  attempted,  and  indeed  have  not  been  able, 
to  introduce  even  the  names  of  the  friends  in  whose 
society  Mr.  Lowell  took  pleasure  while  in  Spain. 
But  American  scholars,  and  indeed  the  scholars  of 
the  world,  have  been  so  much  indebted  to  Senor 
Don  Pascual  de  Gayangos,  whose  recent  death  has 
been  so  widely  regretted,  that  I  ought  not  to  close 
this  chapter  without  referring  to  him. 

This  gentleman  is  another  of  the  distinguished 
men  born  in  1809.  In  early  life  he  studied  in 
France.  He  visited  England  and  married  an  Eng 
lish  lady.  When  he  was  but  twenty-two  years  of 
age  he  held  a  subordinate  place  in  the  administra 
tion  at  Madrid.  He  returned  to  England  while  yet 
a  young  man,  and  resided  there.  Articles  of  his 
will  be  found  in  the  "  Edinburgh  Review  "  at  that 
time.  After  the  Oriental  Society  published  a  trans 
lation  by  him  of  "  Almakkari's  History,"  he  was 
appointed  professor  of  Arabic  in  Madrid.  He  had 
studied  Arabic  under  De  Sacy. 

Every  American  student  in  Spain   for   the  last 


236  JAMES  KUSSELL  LOWELL 

half-century  has  been  indebted  to  his  courtesy,  and, 
I  may  say,  to  his  authority  in  Spain.  As  one  of 
the  humblest  of  those  students  I  am  glad  to  express 
their  obligation  to  him. 

His  only  daughter,  a  charming  lady,  married 
Don  Juan  Riano,  a  distinguished  archaeologist,  who 
is,  I  think,  now  in  the  diplomatic  service  of  the 
Spanish  government.  Her  son,  Don  Pascual's 
grandson,  is  secretary  to  the  queen,  or  has  been  so 
lately.  All  of  them  were  near  friends  of  Lowell. 


CHAPTER  XIV 

MINISTER   TO    ENGLAND 

MR.  LOWELL  had  declined  the  suggestion  that  he 
should  go  to  England  when  Mr.  Hayes's  administra 
tion  came  in.  But  one  need  not  say  that  when  he 
now  determined  to  go  to  England,  he  went  there  with 
the  pleasure  with  which  every  one  of  our  race  visits 
what  we  still  call  the  "  mother  country."  His  an 
cestry,  his  education,  and  the  studies  in  which  he 
had  taken  the  very  broadest  interest,  all  made  him 
love  England. 

He  was  an  American  through  and  through,  and, 
as  his  own  celebrated  address,  which  I  shall  speak  of 
again,  showed  to  the  world,  he  comprehended  de 
mocracy  in  its  possibilities,  in  its  future,  and  in  its 
present  better  than  almost  any  man  of  his  time. 
He  was  better  able  to  show  it  to  the  leaders  of  the 
feudal  communities  in  which  he  lived,  better  than 
any  other  American  who  could  have  been  chosen. 
For  all  this,  —  it  would  be  better  to  say  because  of 
this,  —  he  went  and  came  in  England  with  that  sort 
of  delight  which  Mr.  Edward  Everett  fifty  years 
before  described  so  well :  — 

"  An  American  looks  at  Westminster  Abbey  and 
Stratford-on-Avon  with  an  enthusiasm  which  the 
Englishman  laughs  at  as  a  sort  of  provincial  raw 


ness." 


238  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

TMs  enthusiasm  of  the  American  in  England  is 
so  genuine  that  one  may  not  speak  with  adequate 
contempt  of  the  sneers  with  which  banished  Irish 
men  ridiculed  it,  when  they  had  occasion  to  speak 
of  Mr.  Lowell  while  he  stayed  in  the  home  of  his 
ancestors. 

As  minister  to  England  Mr.  Lowell  rendered 
essential  service  to  his  country.  His  firmness,  se 
renity,  courtesy,  and  diligence  enabled  him  to  keep 
on  the  best  terms  with  the  members  of  the  English 
cabinet  with  whom  he  had  to  do.  He  was  to  a 
remarkable  degree,  as  we  shall  see,  a  favorite  with 
all  classes  of  the  English  people.  He  satisfied  the 
administration  of  President  Hayes,  who  sent  him. 
He  did  not  satisfy  the  more  talkative  leaders  of 
the  Irish- Americans,  who,  to  use  a  happy  phrase  of 
his,  were  like  an  actor  who  "  takes  alternately  the 
characters  of  a  pair  of  twins  who  are  never  seen  on 
the  stage  simultaneously." 

But  nobody  could  have  satisfied  them.  They 
were  in  a  false  position,  —  so  false  that  even  diplo 
macy  of  the  old  fashion  could  not  have  satisfied  it. 
No  man  can  serve  two  masters,  and  no  man  can  be 
a  citizen  of  two  nations  at  the  same  time.  So  those 
gentlemen  found  out  who,  while,  as  Irishmen,  they 
pressed  the  Irish  people  to  revolt,  fell  back  under 
the  aegis  of  America  when  they  got  into  trouble, 
For  the  others,  for  those  who  had  really  made  them^ 
selves  Americans,  and  meant  to  remain  such,  Mr.. 
Lowell  was  more  than  the  advocate.  He  was  their 
fearless  guardian.  And  in  such  guardianship  he  was 
always  successful.  Here,  let  it  be  said,  first  and 


MINISTER  TO  ENGLAND  239 

last,  he  knew  nothing  of  the  morals  of  that  diplo 
macy  of  the  older  fashion.  He  might  have  directed 
a  dispatch  wrong,  so  that  Lord  Granville  should 
read  what  was  meant  for  Mr.  Evarts,  and  Mr.  Evarts 
what  was  meant  for  Lord  Granville,  and  no  harm 
would  have  been  done.  That  was  his  way,  —  as,  be 
it  said,  it  is  the  way  of  gentlemen,  and,  in  general,  of 
our  national  negotiations. 

At  the  same  time  Lowell  made  friends  in  England 
among  all  classes  of  people.  For  a  generation  the 
line  of  American  ministers  had  generally  been  good. 
From  time  to  time  we  sent  one  or  two  fools  there, 
usually  to  get  them  out  of  the  way  of  home  aspira 
tions  and  ambitions.  But  Mr.  Everett,  Mr.  Law 
rence,  Mr.  Bancroft,  Mr.  Adams,  Mr.  Welsh,  and 
Mr.  Motley  were  all  conscientious,  intelligent  gentle 
men,  who  really  were  as  much  interested  in  English 
history  and  English  literature  as  Englishmen  were, 
and  "  really,  you  know,  they  spoke  English  very 
well,  with  almost  no  accent,  you  know." 

Diplomacy,  and  the  whole  business  of  ambassa- 
dory,  is,  in  fact,  about  as  much  out  of  place  in  our 
time  as  chain  mail  is,  or  as  orders  of  precedence 
are.  But  people  of  sense  try  to  make  a  new 
diplomacy  in  which  each  nation  can  approach,  not 
the  government  of  the  other,  but  the  people.  Mr. 
Lowell,  who  could  think  on  his  feet,  who  could 
speak  well  in  public,  who  had  always  something  to 
say,  and  who,  indeed,  liked  to  say  it,  had  a  real 
"  calling"  in  this  line.  In  his  English  stay  he 
made  several  public  speeches  which  did  more  good 
than  any  "  state  paper,"  so  called,  could  have  done. 


• 


240  JAMES  KUSSELL  LOWELL 

In  private  society  he  was  a  f avorite,  as  he  was  every 
where.  In  1882  somebody  told  me  in  London  the 
story  of  an  invitation  which  Lord  Granville,  the 
foreign  minister,  had  sent  him.  Lord  Granville, 
in  a  friendly  note,  asked  him  to  dinner,  saying  at 
the  same  time  that  he  knew  how  foolish  it  was  to 
give  such  short  notice  "  to  the  most  engaged  man  in 
London."  Lowell  replied  that  "  the  most  engaged 
man  is  glad  to  dine  with  the  most  engaging." 

Also,  London  is  an  excellent  place  in  which  to 
study,  and  to  learn  without  studying.  And,  from 
the  first,  Lowell  enjoyed  London  and  England. 
Mrs.  Lowell  was  able  sometimes  to  receive  her 
friends,  and  even  to  bear  the  fatigue  of  a  reception 
at  court,  and  of  presenting  to  the  queen  American 
ladies  who  visited  London.  She  made  herself  most 
welcome  in  the  circle,  not  large,  whom  she  was  able 
to  meet  in  that  way.  The  delicacy  of  her  health, 
however,  prevented  her  husband  from  attempting 
the  more  public  social  functions  of  hospitality,  of 
that  kind  that  consists  mostly  in  calling  people  to 
gether  to  dinners  or  evening  parties.  But  he  was, 
all  the  same,  cordial  to  all  comers  from  his  own 
nation,  ready  and  successful  in  promoting  their 
object,  while,  as  has  been  said,  he  was  at  ease  among 
all  classes  in  England.  His  holidays,  if  we  may  call 
them  so,  were  spent  privately  in  visits  with  friends, 
and  for  six  or  seven  summers  in  Whitby,  —  the 
Whitby  of  "  Marmion,"  in  the  north  of  England,  — 
a  place  of  which  he  was  very  fond. 

He  was  presented  and  began  on  his  formal  duties 
in  the  winter  of  1881-82.  His  stay  in  England 


MINISTER  TO  ENGLAND  241 


lasted  until  June  10,  1885.     Mrs.  Lowell  had 
in  February  of  that  year. 

The  first  important  matter  in  his  negotiations  was 
connected  with  the  Irish  disaffection.  Most  general 
readers  to-day  will  have  forgotten  that  an  insurrec 
tion,  or  plan  of  insurrection,  attributed  to  the  Fenian 
organization,  had  disturbed  Ireland  and  frightened 
England  not  long  before.  The  name  Fenian  was 
taken  from  Fein  McCoil,  the  j^m-gal  of  Ossian. 
Lowell,  who  could  never  resist  a  pun  which  had  any 
sense  in  it,  called  the  Fenians  Fai-neants,  which,  as 
it  proved,  was  fair  enough,  except  that  they  and 
theirs  kept  their  English  masters  in  alarm.  I  was 
talking  with  a  Liberal  in  England  in  May,  1873, 
and  he  said,  "  Why,  if  you  had  landed  in  Ireland, 
you  would  have  been  in  jail  by  this  time«"  I  asked 
what  was  the  matter  with  me.  He  said  that  my 
crush  hat  and  my  broad-toed  shoes  would  have  con 
victed  me.  Now  the  shoes  had  been  bought  in 
Bristol,  only  three  days  before,  and  I  said  so. 
"  Bristol  ?  were  they  ?  Well,  they  knew  you  were 
a  Yankee."  That  is  to  say,  any  one  who  looked 
like  an  outsider  had  to  run  his  chances  with  the 
Irish  constables  of  the  time. 

Among  others  who  were  less  fortunate  than  I, 
Henry  George  was  arrested.  He  was  as  innocent  as 
I,  and  was  at  once  released,  with  proper  apologies. 

The  view  which  Lowell  took,  and  the  dilemma  in 
which  his  Irish  clients  acted,  and  even  went  to 
prison,  are  well  explained  in  a  dispatch  from  which 
I  will  make  a  few  short  extracts.  The  whole  collec 
tion  of  dispatches  shows  the  extreme  unwillingness 
of  Lord  Granville  to  give  offense  in  America  :  — 


242  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

MB.    LOWELL   TO   THE   AMERICAN   SECRETARY. 

March  14,  1882.     (Received  March  27.) 

In  concluding  this  dispatch  I  may  be  permitted 
to  add  that  I  have  had  repeated  assurances  from  the 
highest  authority  that  there  would  be  great  reluc 
tance  in  arresting  a  naturalized  citizen  of  the  United 
States,  were  he  known  to  be  such.  But  it  is  seldom 
known,  and  those  already  arrested  have  acted  in  all 
respects  as  if  they  were  Irishmen,  sometimes  engaged 
in  trade,  sometimes  in  farming,  and  sometimes  filling 
positions  in  the  local  government.  This,  I  think,  is 
illustrated  by  a  phrase  in  one  of  Mr.  Hart's  letters, 
to  the  effect  that  he  never  called  himself  an  Ameri 
can.  He  endeavors,  it  is  true,  in  a  subsequent  letter, 
to  explain  this  away  as  meaning  American  born  ;  but 
it  is  obviously  absurd  that  a  man  living  in  his  native 
village  should  need  to  make  any  such  explanation. 
Naturalized  Irishmen  seem  entirely  to  misconceive 
the  process  through  which  they  have  passed  in 
assuming  American  citizenship,  looking  upon  them 
selves  as  Irishmen  who  have  acquired  a  right  to 
American  protection,  rather  than  as  Americans  who 
have  renounced  a  claim  to  Irish  nationality. 

Simply,  the  view  he  sustained  is  that  which  he  laid 
down  in  two  letters  written  to  Mr.  Barrows,  to  be 
read  to  one  of  these  prisoners,  from  which  here  are 
a  few  extracts.  They  embody  briefly  the  established 
policy  of  our  government :  — 

"The  principles  upon  which  I  have  based  my 
action  in  all  cases  of  applications  to  me  from  natu- 


MINISTER  TO  ENGLAND  243 

ralized  citizens  now  imprisoned  in  Ireland  under  the 
'  Coercion '  Act  are  those  upon  which  our  govern 
ment  has  acted,  and  in  case  of  need  would  act  again. 
I  think  it  important  that  all  such  persons  should  be 
made  to  understand  distinctly  that  they  cannot  be 
Irishmen  and  Americans  at  the  same  time,  as  they 
now  seem  to  suppose,  and  that  they  are  subject  to 
the  operation  of  the  laws  of  the  country  in  which 
they  choose  to  live." 

In  another  letter  he  says  :  — 

"  If  British  subjects  are  being  arrested  for  no 
more  illegal  acts  than  those  which  the  prisoner  is 
charged  with  having  committed,  or  of  the  inten 
tion  to  commit  which  he  is  justly  suspected,  it  seems 
that,  however  arbitrary  and  despotic  we  may  con 
sider  the  f  Coercion '  Act  to  be,  we  are,  neverthe 
less,  bound  to  submit  in  silence  to  the  action  taken 
under  it  by  the  authorities  even  against  our  own 
fellow  citizens. 

"  It  should  be  observed  that  this  act  is  a  law  of 
the  British  Parliament,  the  legitimate  source  and 
final  arbiter  of  all  law  in  these  realms,  and  that,  as 
it  would  be  manifestly  futile  to  ask  the  government 
here  to  make  an  exception  on  behalf  of  an  American 
who  had  brought  himself  within  the  provisions  of 
any  law  thus  sanctioned,  so  it  would  be  manifestly 
unbecoming  in  a  diplomatic  representative,  unless 
by  express  direction  of  his  superiors,  to  enter  upon 
an  argument  with  the  government  to  which  he  is 
accredited  as  to  the  policy  of  such  a  law  or  the  ne 
cessarily  arbitrary  nature  of  its  enforcement." 

That  neither   he  nor  the  American  government 


244  •    JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

was  hard  on  the  "suspects"  appears  from  several 
letters,  of  which  this  illustrates  the  tenor :  — 

TO   OUR  CONSUL  AT  LIMERICK. 

You  will  please  see  without  delay  John  Mclnerny 
and  Patrick  Slattery,  suspects  claiming  to  be  Ameri 
can  citizens  and  confined  in  Limerick  jail,  and  say 
to  each  of  them  that  "  in  case  he  should  be  liberated 
you  have  authority  to  pay  him  forty  pounds  sterling 
for  his  passage  to  the  United  States/'  for  which  sum 
you  may  draw  upon  me  at  sight. 

This  sort  of  correspondence  ended  in  May,  1882. 
The  following  letter  was  practically  the  end  of  it. 

TO  MR.    FRELINGHUYSEN. 

Meanwhile  it  is  nearly  certain  that  all  the  sus 
pects,  except  those  charged  with  crimes  of  violence, 
will  be  very  shortly  set  at  liberty,  thus  rendering 
nugatory  the  most  effective  argument  in  favor  of 
disorder  and  resistance  to  the  law. 

To  turn  from  such  correspondence  to  his  frank 
relations  with  the  people  of  England,  it  is  interest 
ing  to  see  how  readily  he  accepted  the  modern  theory 
of  American  diplomacy.  This  makes  the  foreign 
minister  the  representative  not  only  of  the  admin 
istration,  but  of  every  individual  among  the  people. 
It  recognizes  the  people  as  indeed  the  sovereign.  In 
this  view,  for  instance,  the  American  minister  has  to 
place  rightly  the  inquiries  of  every  person  in  the 
United  States  who  thinks  that  there  is  a  fortune 


MINISTER  TO  ENGLAND  245 

waiting  for  him  in  the  custody  of  the  Court  of 
Chancery.  In  such  cases  the  American  citizen  ad 
dresses  "his  minister"  directly.  On  a  large  scale 
the  foreign  minister  has  the  same  sort  of  correspond 
ence  as  the  "  domestic  minister  "  at  home,  of  whose 
daily  mail  half  is  made  up  of  the  inquiries  of  people 
who  have  not  an  encyclopaedia,  a  directory,  or  a 
dictionary,  or,  having  them,  find  it  more  easy  to 
address  the  clergyman  whose  name  they  first  see  in 
the  newspaper.  They  turn  to  him  to  ask  what  was 
the  origin  of  the  Aryan  race,  or  what  is  meant  by 
the  fourth  estate. 

The  reader  who  has  not  delved  into  the  diplomatic 
correspondence  does  not  readily  conceive  of  the  range 
of  subjects  which  thus  come  under  the  attention  of 
an  American  minister  abroad,  in  the  present  habit, 
which  unites  the  old  diplomacy  and  the  formality  of 
old  centuries  with  the  hustling  end-of-the-century 
practice,  in  which  every  citizen  enjoys  the  attention 
of  the  minister.  In  Lowell's  case  subjects  as  vari 
ous  as  the  burial  of  John  Howard  Payne's  body, 
the  foot-and-mouth  disease  in  cattle,  the  theological 
instruction  in  the  schools  of  Bulgaria,  the  assisted 
emigration  to  America  of  paupers  from  Ireland,  and 
the  nationality  of  Patrick  O'Donnell  occupy  one 
year's  correspondence.  Those  of  us  who  think  that 
the  old  diplomacy  is  as  much  outside  modern  life  as 
chain  mail  is,  or  the  quintessences  of  old  chemistry, 
might  well  take  the  body  of  John  Howard  Payne  as 
an  object-lesson. 

(1)  John  Howard  Payne  wrote  "  Home  Sweet 
Home." 


246  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

(2)  1852.     He  died  and  was   buried   in   Tunis, 
where  he  represented  the  United  States. 

(3)  1882.     Mr.    W.    W.    Corcoran    thought   he 
should  like  to  bury  his  body  in  America,  with   a 
proper  monument. 

(4)  October.     Mr.  Corcoran  asks  the  cooperation 
of  Mr.  Frelinghuysen,  our  Secretary  of  State. 

(5)  October.     Mr.  Frelinghuysen  writes  to   Mr. 
Lowell  to  ask  for  the  intervention  of  the  British  gov 
ernment,  because  we  have  no  representative  in  Tunis. 

(6)  November.     Mr.  Lowell  writes  to  Lord  Gran- 
ville,  the  English  foreign  secretary. 

(7)  November.     Lord  Granville  bids  Mr.  Lister 
attend  to  it. 

(8)  November.     Mr.  Lister  writes  to  Mr.  Reade 
and  to  Mr.  Lowell  to  say  he  has  done  so. 

(9)  January,  1883.     Mr.    Lowell  writes   to   Mr. 
Frelinghuysen  to  say  how  far  they  have  all  got. 

(10)  January.     Mr.  Frelinghuysen  writes  to  Mr. 
Lowell  to  ask  that  the  body  may  be  sent  to  Mar 
seilles. 

(11)  January.     Mr.  Lowell  writes   this  to  Lord 
Granville. 

(12)  January.     Lord  Granville  telegraphs  to  Mr. 
Reade  at  Tunis,  and  writes  to  Mr.  Lowell  that  he 
has  done  so. 

Meanwhile  they  become  impatient  at  Washington, 
and  the  Assistant  Secretary  telegraphs  :  — 

January  2.  "  Have  you  received  news  from  Tunis 
relative  to  Payne's  remains  ?  " 

Mr.  Lowell  telegraphs  back,  much  as  if  it  were 
the  answer  in  the  "  Forty  Thieves:  "  — 


MINISTER  TO  ENGLAND  247 

January  3.     "  Not  yet,  but  presently." 

On  the  same  day,  apparently,  or 

January  1.  Lord  Granville  receives  a  telegram 
from  Tunis,  to  say  that  all  has  been  done,  and  that 
the  remains  would  be  shipped  to  Marseilles. 

January  6.  Mr.  Keade  explains  all  to  Lord 
Granville,  and  also  to  Mr.  Taylor.  Every  one  was 
present  at  the  disinterment  who  should  have  been. 

January  12.  Mr.  Lowell  thanks  Lord  Granville 
and  Mr.  Currie  and  Mr.  Reade  and  all  the  other 
officials. 

February  9.  Mr.  Frelinghuysen  asks  Mr.  Lowell 
to  thank  everybody;  and  it  is  to  be  presumed  he 
does  so. 

Very  well.  This  required  a  good  deal  of  red 
tape.  But  it  was  very  nice  of  Mr.  Corcoran  to  put 
a  monument  to  the  poet  of  "  Home,"  and  somebody 
must  do  something. 

It  is  interesting  to  see  how  wide  are  the  conse 
quences  of  such  courtesies,  and  how  important  they 
may  be. 

Lowell  really  wanted  to  serve  the  American  people, 
and  any  intelligent  question  addressed  to  him  found 
a  courteous  and  intelligent  reply.  It  would  not  be 
difficult  to  give  a  hundred  instances,  and  if  any  of 
the  diplomats  of  to-day  sometimes  groan  under  the 
burden  of  such  correspondence,  let  me  encourage 
them  by  copying  an  autograph  letter  of  his  which 
a  friend  has  sent  to  me  this  morning.  A  public- 
spirited  gentleman  in  Minnesota  had  determined 
that  there  should  be  a  school  of  forestry  in  that 
State.  He  knew  there  was  such  a  school  in  India 


248  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

at  Dehradun.  He  wanted  the  report  of  that  school, 
and  so  he  sent  to  the  United  States  legation  in 
London  to  ask  for  it.  Here  is  Mr.  Lowell's  reply, 
and  it  is  interesting  to  know  from  Mr.  Andrews  that 
it  was  of  real  service  in  the  establishment  of  the  first 
school  of  forestry  of  America :  — 

LEGATION  OF  THE  UNITED  STATES, 
LONDON,  March  10,  1882. 

DEAR  SIK,  —  On  receiving  your  letter  of  the  17th 
of  February  I  at  once  wrote  to  Lord  Hartington, 
who  the  next  day  sent  me  the  report,  which  I  now 
have  the  pleasure  of  forwarding  to  you,  and  espe 
cially  if  it  helps  you  in  awakening  public  opinion  to 
the  conservation  of  our  forests  ere  it  be  too  late.  I 
foresee  a  time  when  our  game  and  forest  laws  will 
be  Draconian  in  proportion  to  their  present  culpable 
laxity. 

Faithfully  yours, 

J.  R.  LOWELL. 

Hon.  C.  C.  ANDREWS. 

A  foreign  minister  of  America  once  said  to  me 
that  Diplomacy  meant  Society,  and  Society  Diplo 
macy.  He  meant  that  the  important  things  are 
done  in  personal  conversation  between  man  and 
man,  as  they  sip  their  coffee  after  a  dinner-party, 
perhaps.  The  conclusions  thus  arrived  at  get  them 
selves  put  into  form  afterwards  in  dispatches.  In 
this  view  of  diplomacy  it  was  fortunate  for  all  parties 
that  Mr.  Lowell  and  Lord  Granville  were  the  corre 
spondents  who  had  American  affairs  in  hand,  from 
such  "  emblems "  as  the  American  flag  on  Lord 


MINISTER  TO  ENGLAND  249 

Mayor's  Day  round  to  the  nationality  of  Mr. 
O'Connor.  Fortunate,  because  the  two  liked  each 
other. 

Lord  Granville's  term  of  office  as  foreign  secre 
tary  was  almost  the  same  as  Lowell's  as  American 
minister.  Granville  came  in  with  the  Gladstone 
ministry  in  April,  1882,  and  he  went  out  of  office 
with  them  in  1885.  Lowell's  personal  relations  with 
him  were  those  of  great  intimacy.  He  not  only  re 
garded  Lord  Granville  with  cordial  respect,  but  knew 
him  as  an  intimate  friend.  In  1886  he  visited  Lord 
Granville  at  Holmbury,  at  a  time  when  Mr.  Glad 
stone  was  also  visiting  there.  "  I  saw  Gladstone  the 
other  day,  and  he  was  as  buoyant  (froyant)  as  when 
I  stayed  with  him  at  Holmbury,  just  before  he 
started  for  Scotland.  I  think  the  Fates  are  with 
him,  and  that  the  Tories  will  have  to  take  up  Home 
Kule  where  he  left  it." 

Lord  Granville  was  very  young  when  he  entered 
Parliament,  as  Mr.  Levison  Gower,  member  for 
Morpeth.  He  is  said  to  have  regretted  the  change 
of  work  in  the  House  of  Lords  when  he  became 
Lord  Granville.  In  1859,  when  he  was  not  forty- 
five  years  old,  the  queen  asked  him  to  form  a  cabi 
net,  and  in  1880  she  consulted  him  with  the  same 
view  again ;  but  he  did  not  become  chief  of  the 
ministry  at  either  time.  He  served  under  Lord 
Palmerston  and  under  Mr.  Gladstone,  as  he  had 
done  under  Lord  John  Russell.  He  was,  while  he 
lived,  the  leader  of  the  Liberals  in  the  House  of 
Lords,  always  in  the  minority,  whatever  the  policy 
of  the  hour,  but  always  cordial,  amiable,  and  con- 


250  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

ciliatory.  On  Gladstone's  retirement  in  1878  he 
was  spoken  of  as  the  real  leader  of  the  Liberal  party. 
It  is  said  of  him  that  he  always  kept  a  friend  who 
was  once  a  friend,  —  that  he  was  willing  to  yield 
small  points  in  controversy  rather  than  to  keep  a 
quarrel  in  existence,  and  always  "  sacrificed  his  per 
sonal  interests  to  those  of  his  party." 

Such  a  man  is  a  friend  whom  one  likes  to  have ; 
and  such  a  character  gives  point  to  Lowell's  joke, 
which  I  have  cited,  which  calls  him  the  most  en 
gaging  man  in  London.  I  remember  with  pleasure 
the  first  time  I  saw  him.  He  was  acting  as  chan 
cellor  of  the  University  of  London  —  as  long  ago  as 
1873.  He  was  presenting  the  diplomas  to  those 
who  had  passed  the  examinations  for  degrees  of 
that  university.  This  means  that  two  or  three  hun 
dred  young  men,  from  all  parts  of  Great  Britain, 
were  presented  to  him,  by  the  heads  of  perhaps 
twenty  different  colleges,  to  receive  this  distinction. 
Now,  such  a  formality  may  be  merely  a  function,,  as 
stupid  to  see  as  stupid  to  go  through.  In  this 
case  there  was  genuine  personal  contact  between  the 
chancellor  and  the  neophyte.  As  each  one  of  those 
youths,  proud  or  timid,  came  up,  and  as  Lord  Gran- 
ville  gave  the  diploma  to  each,  he  detained  him,  for 
the  moment,  by  some  personal  word  or  inquiry,  — 
such  as  you  could  guess  the  man  who  was  entering 
life  would  always  remember.  With  such  a  man 
Lowell  would  be  sure  to  be  on  sympathetic  terms. 
And  I  suppose  they  met  each  other,  or  were  in  close 
correspondence,  almost  every  day  in  the  "  season." 

But  Lowell  was  not  only  the  minister  from  the 


MINISTER  TO  ENGLAND  251 

people ;  he  was  a  messenger  to  the  people.  And  he 
had  sense  enough  and  historical  knowledge  enough 
to  know  that  since  there  has  been  an  America  on 
the  western  side  of  the  Atlantic,  the  people  of  Eng 
land  —  the  rank  and  file  —  have  been  in  sympathy 
with  the  thought  and  feeling  and  purposes  of  that 
American  people.  When  my  brother  Charles  was  in 
London  in  1863,  and  the  English  government  was 
acting,  on  the  whole,  as  badly  as  it  dared  toward 
the  United  States,  a  member  of  the  cabinet  said  to 
him  one  day,  "  The  clubs  are  against  you,  Mr.  Hale, 
but  the  people  of  England  are  with  you."  This 
was  true  then ;  it  was  true  in  the  American  Revolu 
tion  ;  it  was  true  in  Cromwell's  time,  —  he  has  no 
title  which  is  more  sure  than  that  of  the  "  Friend 
of  New  England."  The  same  thing  is  true  to-day. 
Now,  Lowell  never  said  to  himself,  "  Go  to,  I  will 
address  myself  to  the  people  of  Great  Britain,"  or, 
"  The  people  of  Great  Britain  is  one  thing,  and  the 
clubs  of  London  another."  But  because  he  was  the 
man  he  was,  he  was  always  glad  to  meet  the  people 
and  the  men  of  the  people,  and  let  them  really  know 
what  America  is.  It  is  not  the  America  of  inter 
viewers,  of  excursionists,  of  nouveaux  riches  million 
aires,  or  of  namby-pamby  philanthropists  attendant 
on  international  conventions.  These  are  the  indi 
viduals  whom  the  people  of  England  are  most  apt 
to  see.  But  the  people  of  America,  at  home,  have 
wider  interests  than  theirs,  and  affairs  more  impor 
tant  than  they  have.  Lowell  felt  this  in  every  fibre 
of  his  life,  and  if  the  Workingmen's  College  in  Lon 
don,  or  some  public  meeting  at  Birmingham,  or  a 


252  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

Coleridge  monument,  gave  him  a  chance  to  give  to 
the  people  of  England  his  notion  of  what  the  people 
of  America  are,  and  have  in  hand,  why,  he  was 
most  glad  to  do  so. 

This  is  no  place  in  which  to  describe  or  discuss 
his  successes  as  a  public  speaker  in  England.  It 
was  a  matter  of  course  that,  as  soon  as  he  spoke 
once,  whoever  heard  him  would  be  glad  to  hear  him 
again  ;  and  he  must  have  had  proposals  without 
number  for  his  assistance  in  public  dinners,  at  the 
unveiling  of  monuments,  and  in  addresses  of  wider 
range  and  of  more  permanent  importance. 

In  the  two  volumes  of  admirable  memoirs  of  Eng 
lish  life  which  Mr.  Smalley  has  published,  one  chap 
ter  is  given  quite  in  detail  to  the  description  of 
Lowell's  remarkable  welcome  among  Englishmen  of 
every  degree.  In  that  chapter,  which  I  suppose  is 
made  from  one  or  two  letters  published  at  the  time, 
Mr.  Smalley  quotes  "  The  Spectator/'  as  saying 
that  Englishmen,  whether  they  knew  Mr.  Lowell  or 
not,  looked  on  him  as  a  personal  friend. 

Of  all  the  various  addresses  which  contributed, 
each  in  its  place,  to  his  reputation  as  a  public 
speaker,  that  which  I  have  alluded  to,  which  was 
delivered  at  Birmingham,  on  "  Democracy,"  is  the 
most  remarkable.  It  has,  indeed,  become  a  clas 
sic.  It  deserves  its  reputation  ;  and  it  undoubtedly 
states  with  careful  accuracy  Lowell's  foundation 
feeling  as  to  the  institutions  of  this  country,  and 
what  may  be  expected  if  democracy  is  fairly  under 
stood  and  fairly  applied.  No  one  who  was  familiar 
with  him  or  with  his  letters,  or  had  really  studied 


MINISTER  TO  ENGLAND  253 

his  more  serious  poems,  will  regard  any  of  the  ut 
terances  in  this  great  address  as  being  new.  They 
were  the  words  of  a  careful  scholar  who  was  born 
under  favorable  circumstances  in  the  midst  of  demo 
cracy  admirably  well  applied.  His  training  was  all 
the  better  because  the  original  people  of  Massachu 
setts  are,  so  to  speak,  democratic  in  their  origin  and 
in  the  habit  of  their  thought,  without  having  formed 
many  abstract  theories  on  the  subject,  and  being 
always,  indeed,  quite  indifferent  as  to  what  the  spec 
ulative  theory  might  be. 

An  American  minister  abroad  must  not  be  often 
or  long  absent  from  his  post.  But  there  are  methods 
by  which  four  fortnights  of  permitted  absence  may 
be  added  together,  and  your  outing  taken  at  once. 
In  some  way  Lowell  was  thus  free  for  a  tour 
through  the  Continent  to  Italy  in  the  autumn  of 
1881.  In  Italy  he  and  Story  and  Mr.  Richard 
Dana  met.  Dana  was  at  the  Wells  School  with 
him  when  they  were  little  boys,  and  in  Italy  they 
had  that  most  agreeable  of  companions,  Mr.  John 
W.  Field.  Dana  died  the  next  winter,  and  Lowell 
writes  to  Field,  "  The  lesson  for  us  is  to  close  up  " 
—  "if  a  year  or  two  older  than  I,  he  belonged  more 
immediately  to  my  own  set,  and  I  had  known  him 
life  long." 

In  the  summer  of  1882,  returning  from  Spain  to 
America,  I  spent  a  month  in  London.  I  told  Lowell 
one  day  that  I  was  one  of  the  "  round-the-world  " 
correspondents  of  the  Murray  Dictionary,  and  that 
I  wanted  to  call  on  Dr.  Murray.  He  said  he  had 
been  trying  to  do  the  same  thing,  and  proposed  to 


254  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

take  me,  —  an  invitation  which,  of  course,  I  ac 
cepted. 

The  reader  ought  to  know  that  the  Oxford  Dic 
tionary,  now  nearly  half  finished,  was  undertaken 
forty-one  years  ago,  —  as  early  as  1857.  The  first 
suggestion  was  made  by  Dean  Trench,  and,  at  the 
vote  of  the  Philological  Society,  several  hundred 
readers  agreed  to  contribute  notes  made  in  their 
reading  of  English  books,  for  the  materials  of  such 
a  dictionary.  After  twenty-one  years  some  speci 
men  pages  were  prepared  from  the  notes  collected 
by  such  readers,  and  submitted  by  Dr.  Murray  to 
the  Clarendon  Press  in  Oxford.  Dr.  Murray  is  now 
known  through  the  English-speaking  world  for  his 
charge  of  this  magnificent  work,  which,  I  think, 
men  will  always  call  "  Murray's  Dictionary." 

The  directors  of  the  Clarendon  Press  agreed  to 
assume  the  immense  cost  and  charge  of  publication, 
and  in  1888  the  first  volume  of  the  great  series,  now 
as  far  forward  as  H  and  I,  appeared.  The  contribu 
tors'  names  make  a  very  valuable  list  of  people  inter 
ested  in  good  English.  And  the  volumes  thus  far 
published  are  the  treasury  to  which  all  other  diction 
ary-makers  rush  as  their  great  storehouse  of  mate 
rials. 

For  the  purpose  of  systematic  cooperation,  each 
reader  was  prepared  with  formal  printed  blanks. 
Each  of  these  was  to  have,  as  far  as  his  special  read 
ing  showed,  the  history  of  one  word.  That  word  in 
large  letters  was  the  head  of  the  completed  blank. 
The  reader  is  not  necessarily  an  authority  in  lan 
guage.  He  is  a  scout  or  truffle-dog  who  brings  the 


MINISTER  TO  ENGLAND  265 

result  of  his  explorations  to  the  authorities  for  com 
parison  with  other  results. 

Mill  Hill,  where  the  dictionary  was  then  —  shall 
I  say  manufactured  ?  —  is  about  ten  miles,  more  or 
less,  from  the  house  which  Lowell  lived  in.  As 
we  entered  the  cab  which  was  to  take  us,  he  said 
that  he  should  bid  the  cabby  carry  us  through  the 
back  of  the  Park,  a  region  which  I  had  never  seen. 
I  have  been  amused  since  to  see  how  many  traveling 
Americans  can  say  the  same  thing.  Lowell  evidently 
knew  its  turns  and  corners  and  bosks  and  deserts 
well.  Ragged,  barefoot  boys  were  playing  cricket 
in  their  improvised  way  with  the  most  primitive  of 
tools,  such  as  they  had  constructed  from  the  spoils 
of  the  streets.  No  policeman  bade  them  leave  the 
place,  no  sign  intimated  that  they  were  to  keep  off 
the  grass ;  an  admirable  loafers'  paradise  for  the 
real  children  of  the  public,  such  as  there  is  not  in 
our  tidy  Common  in  Boston,  and  such  as  I  never 
saw  in  the  Central  Park  of  New  York.  It  was 
pleasant  to  see  how  thoroughly  at  home  Lowell  was 
there.  To  such  retreats  in  London  he  alludes  again 
and  again  in  his  letters  :  "  I  have  only  to  walk  a 
hundred  yards  from  my  door  to  be  in  Hyde  Park, 
where,  and  in  Kensington  Gardens,  I  can  tread  on 
green  turf  and  hear  the  thrushes  sing  all  winter. 
...  As  for  the  climate,  it  suits  me  better  than  any 
I  have  ever  lived  in." 

Spare  a  moment,  dear  reader,  to  find  what  greeted 
us  at  the  Dictionary  House.  I  doubt  if  they  have 
yet  invented  any  such  name  as  Apotheka,  or  Power 
house,  or  Granary.  As  why  should  they,  seeing 


256  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

this  is  the  only  such  house  in  the  world  ?  A  circu 
lar  house  of  corrugated  iron,  originally  built  for  a 
church,  I  believe,  perhaps  fifty  feet  in  diameter, 
perhaps  twenty-five  feet  high,  lighted  from  the  top. 
It  reminded  me,  at  the  instant,  of  the  great  read 
ing-room  of  the  British  Museum,  though  not  so 
large.  Here  was  Dr.  Murray,  the  distinguished 
director,  at  work  with  his  staff  of  gentlemen  and 
ladies.  Of  course  he  was  delighted  to  see  Lowell 
on  the  spot,  and  in  the  simplest  and  kindest  way 
he  showed  us  the  method  of  the  work. 

Every  day's  mail  brought  to  this  curious  temple 
of  language  its  new  tribute  to  the  history  of  the 
English  tongue.  The  slips  which  I  have  tried  to 
describe  come  from  Cranberry  Centre  and  Big  Lick, 
from  Edinburgh  and  from  Hongkong.  Once  a 
month  each  of  the  thousand  or  more  readers  mails 
his  budgets,  so  there  would  be  every  day  a  new  par 
cel  to  be  assorted ;  and  we  were  ready  for  them  at 
Mill  Hill.  Here  were  twenty  or  thirty  thousand 
pamphlet-boxes  into  which  these  slips  were  at  once 
sorted.  The  boxes  were  arranged  in  alphabetical 
order,  beginning  with  that  which  held  the  slips  of 
the  title  word  A,  and  only  ending,  say,  with  box 
33,333,  with  the  box  of  ZYX  —  if  there  be  so 
convenient  a  word  in  the  English  language. 

All  which  I  describe  in  this  detail,  because  I 
should  be  glad  if  the  reader  will  imagine  the  gay, 
bright,  wise,  and  instructive  talk  which  followed  — 
oh,  for  an  hour,  perhaps  hours  —  between  Dr.  Mur 
ray,  the  first  authority  as  to  English  words,  and 
Lowell,  the  authority  most  to  be  relied  on  as  to  the 


MINISTER  TO  ENGLAND  257 

language  of  New  England.  It  was  not  far  from  the 
time  when  Lowell  told  the  Oxford  gentlemen  at  a 
public  dinner  that  they  spoke  English  almost  as  well 
as  their  cousins  in  America.  No,  I  do  not  remem 
ber  what  were  the  words  these  gentlemen  discussed. 
But  each  was  as  eager  as  the  other.  Was  it  "  dod 
dered  "  or  "  daddock  "  ?  I  do  not  know.  "  Miss 
Mary,  will  you  have  the  goodness  to  bring  us  '  dod 
der  '  ?  "  And  Miss  Mary  puts  up  a  light  ladder  to 
her  D  0  shelf  and  returns  with  the  pasteboard  box 
which  has  five  and  twenty  uses  of  "dodder"  between 
the  days  of  Wiclif  and  Besant,  and  the  two  scholars 
dissect  and  discuss.  You  would  think  that  Lowell 
had  never  thought  of  anything  else.  And  yet  it  is 
the  same  Lowell  who  in  a  quiet  corner  of  Mrs.  Leo 
Hunter's  to-night  will  be  discussing  with  Lord  Gran- 
ville  the  amount  and  quality  of  the  theology  which 
the  Great  Powers  shall  permit  in  the  secondary 
schools  of  Bulgaria ! 

I  must  not  try  to  give  any  account  in  detail  of 
the  company  of  literary  men  and  women  whom  Low 
ell  found  in  London.  Two  careful  and  interesting 
papers  by  Mr.  Bowker,  published  in  "  Harper's  "  in 
1888  and  1889,  are  well  worth  the  reader's  atten 
tion.  From  these  papers  I  have  made  some  lists  o£ 
people,  almost  any  one  of  whom  you  would  be  glad 
to  have  met,  who  worked  their  pens  in  London,  or 
printed  their  books  there,  in  those  years.  Mr. 
Bowker  himself,  as  the  English  representative  of 
"  Harper's,"  was  living  there,  and  his  personal  notes 
of  these  people  are  valuable  as  they  are  entertaining. 
Of  novelists  alone  he  gives  a  list  in  which  are  these 
names ;  — 


258  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

Wilkie  Collins,  Richard  Doddridge  Blackmore, 
Miss  Braddon  (Mrs.  Maxwell),  Dinah  M.  Craik, 
Thomas  Hardy,  Walter  Besant,  James  Payn,  David 
Christie  Murray,  Henry  Rider  Haggard,  Robert 
Louis  Stevenson,  Clark  Russell. 

Take  those  ten  names  only,  and  you  say,  as  a  lady 
once  said  to  me,  "  Any  one  of  them  would  make  the 
fortune  of  a  reception."  But  Mr.  Bowker's  next 
ten  do  not  pale  in  comparison  :  — 

F.  W.  Robinson,  George  Macdonald,  George 
Meredith,  W.  E.  Norris,  Mrs.  Ritchie  (Anne  Thack 
eray),  Mrs.  Oliphant,  Amelia  Blandford  Edwards, 
Mrs.  Elizabeth  Lynn  Linton,  Miss  Yonge,  and  Mrs. 
Macquoid.  Observe,  these  twenty  are  only  some  of 
the  novelists. 

Among  other  men  and  women  of  letters,  there  are 
Tennyson,  Browning,  Hughes,  Bailey,  both  Morrises, 
Domett,  Taylor,  Mallock,  Kinglake,  our  dear  old 
Martin  Tupper,  Stephen,  Walter  H.  Pater,  Adding- 
ton  Symonds,  Swinburne,  Buchanan,  the  Rossettis, 
Jean  Ingelow,  Owen  Meredith,  Matthew  Arnold, 
Austin  Dobson,  Alfred  Austin,  Coventry  Patmore, 
Gerald  Massey,  Max  Miiller,  Spencer,  Tyndall  and 
Huxley,  Lubbock,  and  the  two  Cardinals,  Manning 
and  Newman.  Other  clergyman  are  Farrar,  Haweis, 
and  Spurgeon.  Besides  these,  among  men  who  have 
done  more  than  write  books,  there  are,  in  Mr.  Bow 
ker's  lists,  Froude,  McCarthy,  and  Lecky  to  repre 
sent  history,  and  Dr.  Smith,  king  of  dictionaries. 
Smiles,  the  self-help  man,  Colvin,  and  Hamilton  are 
others. 

I  think  I  may  say  that  Lowell  knew  personally  all 


THOMAS    HUGHES 


MINISTER  TO  ENGLAND  259 

the  more  distinguished  of  the  persons  in  these  very 
interesting  groups  before  he  left  London.  He 
formed  some  very  tender  friendships  among  them, 
and  in  the  collection  of  his  letters  none  are  more 
affectionate,  none  are  more  entertaining,  than  are 
those  to  his  English  friends.  Besides  those  named 
in  the  lists  above  there  are  ladies,  —  Mrs.  Stephen, 
the  Misses  Lawrence,  Mrs.  Clifford;  and  Gordon, 
Du  Maurier,  Lord  Dufferin,  are  mentioned  as  people 
with  whom  he  was  in  pleasant  relations.  Lady 
Lyttelton  was  a  most  intimate  friend  of  Mr.  and 
Mrs.  Lowell. 

Among  other  intimate  friends,  Judge  Hughes  and 
Mrs.  Hughes.  Dr.  Hughes,  as  every  one  knows,  had 
been  a  guest  at  Elmwood,  and  Mr.  Lowell  during 
his  residence  as  our  minister  in  England,  and  in 
his  visits  there  afterwards,  would  have  thought  a 
summer  wasted  indeed  if  he  had  not  received  the 
welcome  of  these  dear  friends. 

With  the  election  of  Mr.  Cleveland  in  the  autumn 
of  1884  Lowell  knew  that  his  stay  in  England  would 
come  to  a  close.  For  ten  or  fifteen  years,  indeed, 
he  had  been  in  public  antagonism  to  Mr.  Elaine,  and 
he  would  never  have  served  under  him  as  President 
in  the  English  legation.  More  than  this,  however, 
Mrs.  Lowell  died  in  the  spring  of  1885,  unex 
pectedly,  of  course,  for  death  is  always  unexpected. 
"We  had  taken  it  for  granted  together  that  she 
would  outlive  me,  and  that  would  have  been  best." 
How  many  a  man  and  woman  have  had  to  say  some 
thing  like  that ! 

She   had  been  an  invalid,  with  critical  ups  and 


260  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

downs.  But  her  unfailing  sympathy  for  him  and 
his  work  had  never  yielded,  and  those  who  remember 
him  in  the  closest  intimacies  of  London  life  always 
speak  of  her  with  tenderness.  She  was  almost 
always  shut  up  at  home,  and  he  was  everywhere, 
among  people  of  all  sorts  and  conditions.  But  the 
very  difference  of  their  lives  when  they  were  parted 
seemed  to  make  their  companionship  more  tender 
when  they  were  at  home. 

Of  his  departure  from  England,  his  cousin,  Mr. 
Abbott  Lawrence  Lowell,  says,  with  truth  :  — 

"  But  his  usefulness  as  a  minister  far  transcended 
the  import  of  any  specific  questions  that  arose.  It 
was  his  personal  presence  there,  winning  the  respect 
and  admiration  of  the  English  for  all  that  is  best  in 
America,  that  was  most  valuable.  Among  the  many 
surprises  in  Mr.  Lowell's  life  none  is  perhaps  greater 
than  that,  after  writing  so  bitterly  about  Mason  and 
Slidell,  he  should  have  been  instrumental  in  soothing 
the  irritation  between  England  and  America  that 
arose  out  of  the  civil  war ;  but  such  is  the  case,  and 
it  is  not  too  much  to  say  that  he  did  more  than  any 
one  else  towards  removing  the  prejudice  which  the 
upper  classes  in  England  had  for  the  United  States." 
And  Mr.  Smalley  at  the  time  wrote  from  London  :  — 

"  The  announcement  of  Mr.  Lowell's  recall  gives 
rise  to  many  expressions  of  regret  and  good  will 
besides  those  which  appear  in  the  newspapers.  Nor 
is  the  expression  of  good  will  a  new  thing.  His 
writings,  his  speeches,  and  his  public  services  had 
brought  him  so  close  to  all  English-speaking  people 
that  their  f eeling  toward  him  was  one  of  affection ; 


MINISTER  TO  ENGLAND  261 

in  short,  there  were  ninety  millions  who  would  rejoice 
in  any  good  fortune  that  befell  him,  and  sympa 
thize  with  him  in  trouble.  The  solicitude  to  know 
whether  he  was  to  remain  minister  has  been  general. 
6  Will  President  Cleveland  keep  Mr.  Lowell  in  Lon 
don  ? '  is  the  question  which  every  American  in 
London  has  been  asked  over  and  over  again  since 
last  November  ;  perhaps  twice  a  day  on  an  average. 
And  when  the  inquiring  Briton  was  told  that  Mr. 
Lowell  would  have  to  go,  the  next  question  gen 
erally  was,  '  What,  then,  did  the  President  mean  by 
Civil  Service  Reform  ?  '  " 
What  indeed? 


CHAPTER  XV 

HOME    AGAIN 

LOWELL  landed  in  America  again  in  June,  1885. 
It  was  nearly  seven  years  since  he  left  us  on  his 
way  to  Spain.  And  these  were  seven  years  which 
had  changed,  in  a  thousand  regards,  the  conditions 
of  his  old  American  home. 

In  August,  1891,  he  died,  seventy-two  years  old, — 
six  years  after  this  return.  Of  these  years  we  have 
in  his  letters  a  record  of  pathetic  interest,  and  every 
one  who  knew  him  and  who  loved  him  will  say  that 
of  the  seven  decades  of  life  —  to  which  more  than 
once  he  alludes  —  he  never  seemed  more  cheerful 
and  companionable  and  cordial  and  wise  than  in  the 
seventh.  "  And  young,"  he  would  often  have  said 
himself.  He  discusses  old  age  and  its  coming  in  his 
letters  to  near  friends,  —  yet  perhaps  more  than  is 
wise,  certainly  more  than  is  necessary.  But  once 
and  again  he  tells  his  correspondent  that  he  is  as 
young  as  a  boy.  He  signs  himself,  in  writing  to 
Gilder,  "  Giacopo  il  Kigiovinato."  And  he  writes 
out:  — 

From  the  Universal  Eavesdropper : 
ANECDOTE  OF  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL. 

Passing  along  the  Edgeware  Road  with  a  friend 
two  years  ago,  their  eyes  were  attracted  by  a  sign 


HOME  AGAIN  263 

with  this  inscription,  "  Hospital  for  Incurable  Chil 
dren."  Turning  to  his  companion,  with  that  genial 
smile  for  which  he  is  remarkable,  Lowell  said  quietly, 
"  There's  where  they  '11  send  me  one  of  these  days." 

But,  all  the  same,  seven  years  of  Europe  had 
changed  Elm  wood  and  Cambridge  and  Harvard  Col 
lege  and  New  England  and  America  and  the  world. 
In  a  way,  of  course,  Lowell  knew  this  as  well  as 
any  man.  He  knew  it  better  than  most  men  knew 
it.  And  there  were  a  good  many  sad  things  in 
his  arrival,  as  there  must  be  after  seven  years.  So 
many  deaths  of  old  friends !  So  many  changes  in 
the  daily  life  of  the  people  around  him  !  And  he, 
almost  without  a  vocation ;  obliged  to  establish  his 
new  avocations ! 

Some  years  before  this,  Mr.  Lothrop  Motley,  in 
all  the  triumph  of  his  well-earned  success  after  the 
publication  of  his  first  volumes  of  history,  came  back 
to  his  old  home  —  shall  I  say  for  a  holiday  ?  I  do 
not  know  but  that  he  meant  to  reside  here.  Not 
many  months  after  he  arrived,  however,  he  told  me, 
to  my  surprise,  that  he  was  going  back  to  Europe. 
He  was  going  to  work  in  Holland  on  the  archives 
again ;  to  continue  his  great  historical  enterprise.  I 
need  not  say  that  I  expressed  my  regret  that  he  was 
to  leave  us  so  soon.  But  he  replied,  almost  sadly, 
that  there  was  no  place  here  in  Boston  for  a  man 
who  was  not  at  work :  "  You  ought  to  hang  out  a 
long  pendant  from  one  of  the  forts  in  the  harbor  to 
the  other,  and  write  on  it, '  No  admittance  except  on 
business.' '  This  was  fatally  true  then  of  Boston ; 
it  is  near  the  truth  now. 


264  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

And  Lowell  was  no  longer  a  diplomatist ;  nor  had 
he  any  special  abuses  to  reform ;  he  had  no  regu 
lar  lectures  to  deliver ;  he  had  no  wife  with  whom 
to  talk  and  read  and  make  dinner  linger  long,  and 
breakfast  and  lunch.  He  was  in  a  changed  world, 
and  for  that  world  had  to  prepare  himself. 

Perhaps  it  is  as  well  to  say  that  Boston  also  was 
changed;  the  Boston  of  1885  was  not  the  Boston 
of  1838.  The  late  Mr.  Amos  Adams  Lawrence  said 
to  me,  not  long  before  his  death,  that  his  father 
used  to  say  that  in  the  beginning  of  the  century 
Boston  was  governed  by  the  great  national  mer 
chants:  such  men  as  "Billy  Gray,"  one  of  whose 
ships  discovered  the  Columbia  Eiver  ;  or  as  Colonel 
Perkins,  who  handled  the  trade  of  the  East  in  the 
spirit  in  which  a  great  artist  composes  a  great 
picture ;  or  as  William  Tudor,  who  supplied  ice  to 
the  tropics,  and  when  a  winter  failed  him  in  New 
England,  sent  his  schooners  up  into  Baffin's  Bay  to 
cut  ice  from  the  icebergs. 

Mr.  Lawrence  said  that  when  this  sort  of  men 
gave  up  the  government  of  Boston,  it  fell  into  the 
hands  of  the  great  mechanics :  such  men  as  de 
veloped  the  quarries  at  Quincy;  as  built  Bunker 
Hill  Monument,  and  in  later  days  have  built  the 
Mechanics'  Hall,  have  united  Boston  with  San 
Francisco  and  all  the  Pacific  coast  by  rail.  And 
then,  he  said,  the  government  of  Boston  passed  into 
the  hands  which  hold  it  now,  —  into  the  hands  of 
the  distillers  and  brewers  and  retailers  of  liquor. 

So  far  as  the  incident  or  accident  of  administra 
tion  goes,  this  bitter  satire  is  true  ;  and  it  expresses 


HOME  AGAIN  265 

one  detail  of  the  change  between  the  Boston  of  the 
middle  of  this  century  and  the  Boston  to  which 
Lowell  returned  in  June  of  1885.  Now,  such  a 
change  affects  social  order ;  it  affects  conversation ; 
in  spite  of  you,  it  affects  literature.  Thus  it  affects 
philanthropy.  The  Boston  of  1840  really  believed 
that  a  visible  City  of  God  could  be  established  here 
by  the  forces  which  it  had  at  command.  It  was 
very  hard  in  1885  to  make  the  Boston  of  that  year 
believe  any  such  thing. 

But  Lowell  was  no  pessimist.  He  was  proud  of 
his  home,  and  I  think  you  would  not  have  caught 
him  in  expressing  in  public  any  such  contrast  as 
I  have  ventured  upon  in  these  lines.  On  the  other 
hand,  the  letters  which  Mr.  Norton  has  published  in 
his  charming  volumes  confirm  entirely  the  impression 
which  Lowell's  old  friends  received  from  him :  that 
he  was  glad,  so  glad,  to  be  at  home;  that  he  had 
much  to  do  in  picking  up  his  dropped  stitches ;  and 
that  he  liked  nothing  better  than  to  renew  the  old 
associations.  It  was,  so  to  speak,  unfortunate  that 
he  could  not  at  once  return  to  Elmwood.  In  fact, 
he  did  not  establish  himself  there  for  three  years. 
But,  on  the  other  hand,  at  Southborough,  five-and- 
twenty  miles  from  Boston,  where  he  lived  at  the 
home  of  Mrs.  Burnett,  his  daughter,  he  had  a 
beautiful  country  around  him,  and,  what  was  always 
a  pleasure  to  him,  the  exploration  of  new  scenery. 

I  asked  a  near  friend  of  his  if  Lowell  were  the 
least  bit  wilted  after  his  return.  "  Wilted  ?  I  should 
say  not  a  bit.  Bored  ?  yes ;  worried,  a  little.  But," 
he  added,  as  I  should  do  myself,  "  the  last  talk  I 


W  JAMES  KTS>Z11   LOWELL 

had  with  him,  or  rather  listened  to,  I  shall  never 


He  spent  the  winter  of  1889  in  Boston  with  his 
dear  aster,  Mrs.  Putnam,  from  whose  recollections 
I  was  able  to  give  the  charming  account  which  he 
famished  to  as  of  his  childhood  for  the  first  pages 
of  this  series.  We  hare  lost  her  from  this  world 
since  those  pages  were  first  printed.  And  he  was, 
of  coarse,  near  his  old  friends  and  kindred  :  Dr. 
Holmes,  John  Holmes,  all  the  Saturday  Club,  Dr. 
Howe,  Charles  Norton,  —  his  intimate  and  tender 
friendship  with  whom  was  one  of  the  great  blessings 
of  his  life.  These  were  all  around  him.  But  there 
was  no  Longfellow,  no  Appleton,  no  Emerson,  no 
Agassiz,  no  Dana,  no  Page;  Story  was  in  Europe. 

For  occupation,  he  had  just  as  many  opportunities 
for  public  speaking  as  he  chose  to  use.  He  had  to 
prepare  for  the  press  the  uniform  edition  of  his 
works,  both  in  prose  and  in  poetry.  It  seems  to  me 
that  he  was  too  fastidious  and  rigid  in  this  work. 
I  think  he  left  out  a  good  deal  which  ought  to  have 
been  preserved  there.  And  this  makes  it  certain 
that  the  little  side-scraps  which  the  newspapers  pre 
served,  or  such  as  linger  in  some  else  forgotten 
magazine,  wfll  be  regarded  as  among  the  treasures 
of  collectors.  More  than  that,  many  a  boy  and 
many  a  girl  wfll  owe  to  some  such  scraps  inspira 
tions  which  wiH  last  them  through  life.  He  occa 
sionally  published  a  poem,  and  occasionally  delivered 
an  address  or  lecture.  But  he  took  better  care  of 
himself  than  in  the  old  days.  There  was  no  such 
cnsB  before  the  country  as  had  engaged  him  then  : 

•  m 


WILLIAM    PAGE 


HOME   AGAIN  267 

and,  in  a  way,  it  may  be  said  that  he  enjoyed  the 
literary  leisure  which  he  deserved. 

He  was,  alas!  at  many  periods  during  thes 
years  a  very  sad  sufferer  from  sickness.  Ther 
something  very  pathetic  in  the  manly  way  in  which 
he  alludes  to  such  suffering.  From  no  indulgence 
of  his  own,  he  was  a  victim  of  hereditary  gout;  and 
you  find  in  the  letters  allusions  to  attacks  which 
kept  him  in  agony,  which  sometimes  lasted  for  six 
weeks  in  succession.  Then  the  attack  would  end 
instantly ;  and  Lowell  would  write  in  the  strain 
which  has  been  referred  to,  as  if  he  were  a  boy 
again,  skating  on  Fresh  Pond  or  tracing  up  Beaver 
Brook  to  its  sources. 

Simply,  he  would  not  annoy  his  friends  by  talking 
about  his  pains.  If  he  could  cheer  them  up  by 
writing  of  his  recovery,  he  would  do  so. 

I  remember  that  on  the  first  visit  I  made  him 
after  he  was  reestablished  at  Elmwood,  when  I  con 
gratulated  him  because  he  was  at  home  again,  he 
said,  with  a  smile  still.  "  Yes.  it  is  very  nice  to  be 
here;  but  the  old  house  is  full  of  ghosts."  Ui 
course  it  was.  His  father  and  mother  were  no 
longer  living;  Mrs.  Burnett,  who  was  with  him 
there,  was  the  only  one  of  his  children  who  had  sur 
vived  ;  and  the  circle  of  his  brothers  and  sisters  had 
been  sadly  diminished.  He  and  his  brother,  Ro 
Lowell,  died  in  the  same  year.  Still,  he  was  here 
with  his  own  books ;  he  had  the  old  college  library 
under  his  lee,  and  he  had  old  friends  close  at  hand. 
Once  or  twice  in  his  letters  of  those  days  he  u  M 
into  some  review  of  his  own  literary  endeavor.  Cer- 


268  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

tainly  he  had  reason  to  be  proud  of  it.  Certainly  he 
was  not  too  proud ;  and  I  think  he  did  have  a  feel 
ing  of  satisfaction  that  his  neighbors  and  his  country 
appreciated  the  motive  with  which  he  had  worked 
and  the  real  success  which  he  had  attained. 

As  the  great  address  at  Birmingham  sums  up 
conveniently  the  political  principles  which  governed 
his  life,  whether  in  literature  or  in  diplomacy,  so 
the  address  at  the  quarter-millennium  celebration  of 
Harvard  College  at  Cambridge  may  be  said  to  pre 
sent  a  summary  of  such  theories  as  he  had  formed 
on  education,  and  of  his  hopes  and  his  fears  for  the 
future  of  education.  There  are  two  or  three  apho 
risms  there  which  I  think  will  be  apt  to  be  quoted 
fifty  years  hence,  perhaps,  as  they  are  not  quoted 
to-day.  In  the  midst  of  a  hundred  or  more  of  gen 
tlemen  who  had  served  with  him  in  the  college  he  had 
the  courage  to  say,  "  Harvard  has  as  yet  developed 
no  great  educator  ;  for  we  imported  Agassiz." 

On  the  30th  of  April,  1889,  there  was  a  mag 
nificent  festival  in  the  city  of  New  York,  at  which 
he  spoke.  It  is  already  forgotten  by  the  people  of 
that  city  and  of  the  country,  but  at  the  moment  it 
engaged  universal  attention.  It  was  the  celebration 
of  the  centennial  of  the  establishment  of  the  United 
States  as  a  nation  ;  the  centennial  of  the  birth  of  the 
Constitution ;  of  the  inauguration  of  Washington. 
It  was,  of  course,  the  fit  occasion  for  the  expression 
of  the  people's  gratitude  for  the  blessings  which 
have  followed  on  the  establishment  of  the  federal 
Constitution. 

For  this  celebration  the  most  admirable  arrange- 


HOME  AGAIN  269 

ments  were  made  in  New  York  by  the  committee 
which  had  taken  the  matter  in  hand.  In  the  even 
ing  a  banquet  was  served  at  the  Metropolitan  Opera- 
House,  and  many  of  the  most  distinguished  speakers 
in  the  country  had  gladly  accepted  the  invitation  to 
be  present.  Among  them  Lowell  naturally  was  one. 
But  to  those  who  listened,  it  seemed  as  if  all  these 
great  men  were  in  a  sort  awed  by  the  greatness  of 
the  occasion.  His  address,  perhaps  because  so  care 
fully  prepared,  was  for  the  purpose  no  better  than 
any  of  the  others.  They  could  not  help  it.  Every 
man  who  spoke  was  asking  himself  how  his  speech 
would  read  in  the  year  1989.  There  was  no  spon 
taneity  ;  instead  of  it  there  was  decorum  and  con 
sideration,  the  determination  to  think  wisely,  and 
none  of  the  eloquence  which  "  belongs  to  the  man 
and  the  occasion."  For  hour  after  hour  the  patient 
stream  of  considerate  commonplace  flowed  on,  till 
at  two  in  the  morning  the  new  President  of  the 
United  States  made  the  closing  speech.  The  ex 
pectation  of  this  address,  and  that  alone,  had  held 
the  great  audience  together.  He  was  probably  the 
only  man  who  had  not  had  a  chance  "  to  make  any 
preparation."  He  had  gone  through  the  day  alive 
with  the  feeling  of  the  day,  drinking  in  its  inspira 
tions  ;  and  with  such  preparation  as  six  hours  at  the 
dinner-table  would  give  him,  he  rose  to  say  what 
the  day  had  taught  him.  He  made  one  of  the  most 
magnificent  addresses  to  which  I  have  ever  listened. 
He  led  with  him  from  height  to  height  an  audience 
jaded  and  tired  by  the  dignity  of  lawyers,  the  dex 
terity  of  politicians,  and  the  commonplace  of  schol- 


270  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

ars.  In  fifteen  minutes  he  had  established  his  own 
reputation  as  a  great  public  orator  among  the  thou 
sand  men  who  were  fortunate  enough  to  hear  him. 

And  yet,  such  is  the  satire  of  what  we  call  his 
tory  that,  because  the  other  speeches  had  been  writ 
ten  out  and  could  be  sent  to  the  journals,  —  because 
even  a  New  York  morning  newspaper  has  to  go  to 
press  at  some  time,  —  this  absolutely  extemporaneous 
speech  of  the  one  man  who  proved  himself  equal  to 
the  occasion  did  not  get  itself  reported  in  any  ade 
quate  form,  and  will  never  go  down  into  history. 
There  is,  however,  no  danger  that  any  of  the  other 
addresses  of  that  great  ceremonial  will  be  read  at 
the  end  of  the  hundred  years. 

His  cousin  says  that  Mr.  Lowell  was  chiefly  occu 
pied  by  his  addresses  and  other  prose  essays  in  the 
first  years  after  his  return,  but  that  he  wrote  a 
few  poems.  Most  of  these  will  be  found  in  the 
"  Atlantic."  For  the  Lowell  Institute  he  prepared 
a  course  of  lectures  on  the  old  English  dramatists, 
which  have  been  published  since  his  death.  Of  his 
addresses  he  printed  but  few,  but  the  address  on 
"  The  Independent  in  Politics,"  which  he  delivered 
in  1888  before  the  New  York  Eeform  Club,  was 
printed  by  that  club. 

Of  his  Cambridge  life  after  his  return  to  Elm- 
wood  his  cousin  writes  :  "  The  house  was  haunted 
by  sad  memories,  but  at  least  he  was  once  more 
among  his  books.  The  library,  which  filled  the 
two  rooms  on  the  ground  floor  to  the  left  of  the 
front  door,  had  been  constantly  growing,  and  during 
his  stay  in  Europe  he  had  bought  rare  works  with 


HOME  AGAIN  271 

the  intention  of  leaving  them  to  Harvard  College. 
Here  he  would  sit  when  sad  or  unwell  and  read  Cal- 
deron,  the  '  Nightingale  in  the  Study/  in  whom  he 
always  found  a  solace.  Except  for  occasional  at 
tacks  of  the  gout,  his  life  had  been  singularly  free 
from  sickness,  but  he  had  been  at  home  only  a  few 
months  when  he  was  taken  ill,  and,  after  the  strug 
gle  of  a  strong  man  to  keep  up  as  long  as  possible, 
he  was  forced  to  go  to  bed.  In  a  few  days  his  con 
dition  became  so  serious  that  the  physicians  feared 
he  would  not  live;  but  he  rallied,  and,  although 
too  weak  to  go  to  England,  as  he  had  planned,  he 
appeared  to  be  comparatively  well.  When  taken 
sick,  he  had  been  preparing  a  new  edition  of  his 
works,  the  only  full  collection  that  had  ever  been 
made,  and  he  had  the  satisfaction  of  publishing  it 
soon  after  his  recovery.  This  was  the  last  literary 
work  he  was  destined  to  do,  and  it  rounded  off  fitly 
his  career  as  a  man  of  letters." 

Of  these  six  years  perhaps  his  friends  remember 
his  conversation  most.  Like  other  great  men  and 
good  men,  he  did  not  insist  on  choosing  the  subject 
for  conversation  himself,  but  adapted  himself  to  the 
wishes  and  notions  of  the  people  around  him.  His 
memory  was  so  absolute,  his  fancy  was  so  free,  and 
his  experience  so  wide  that  he  seemed  as  much  at 
home  in  one  subject  as  in  another.  But  when  he 
had  quite  his  own  way  among  a  circle  of  people 
more  or  less  interested  in  books  or  literature,  the 
talk  was  quite  sure  to  drift  round  into  some  discus 
sion  of  etymologies,  of  dialect,  or  of  the  change  of 
habit  which  comes  in  as  one  or  two  centuries  go  by. 


272  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

And  when  his  curiosity  was  once  excited  about  a 
word  —  as  I  said  when  I  was  speaking  of  his  talk 
with  Mr.  Murray  —  he  would  hold  on  to  that  word 
as  a  genealogist  holds  on  to  the  biography  of  a  great- 
grandmother  of  whom  he  only  knows  half  the  name. 
Here  are  one  or  two  passages  from  notes  which  illus 
trate  what  I  mean  :  "  I  used  to  know  some  about 
Pennsylvania  Dutch,  but  forget  their  names."  "  I 
wish  I  could  have  studied  the  Western  lingo  more, 
for  it  has  colored  our  national  speech  most."  "  I 
think  perhaps  W.  P.  Garrison  might  put  you  on  the 
track  of  something  about  the  Southern  patois" 

"  Pitch  into  the  abuse  of  ( will '  and  '  shall/ 
e  would '  and  '  should ; '  when  we  were  boys,  no 
New  Englander  was  capable  of  confounding  them. 
I  am  expecting  a  statute  saying  that  a  murderer 
'  will  be  hanged  by  the  neck  till  he  is  dead.'  Alas 
the  day ! "  And  again,  "  Daddock  I  knew,  but 
never  met  it  alive ;  dodder,  for  a  tree  whose  wood 
is  beginning  to  grow  pulpy  with  decay,  I  have  heard, 
and  the  two  words  may  be  cousins.  The  latter, 
however,  I  believe  to  be  a  modern  importation." 
Murray  and  the  dictionaries  confirm  his  quick  guess 
between  the  relation  of  one  of  these  words  to  the 
other. 

We  have  a  fine  American  proverb,  "  Get  the 
best."  In  later  years  I  have  tried  to  make  some 
Western  State  adopt  it  for  its  state  seal.  I  have 
never  seen  it  in  any  earlier  use  than  in  one  of  Low 
ell's  pleasant  letters  describing  a  canoe  voyage  in 
Maine  ;  and  I  wrote  to  him  rather  late  in  his  life 
to  ask  him  if  he  were  the  inventor  of  the  phrase. 


A<;AIN  ^73 

It  has  been  adopted,  as  the  reader  may  be  apt  to 
remember,  l>y  the  authors  of  Webster's  Dictionary, 
and  is  a  sort  of  trade-mark  to  their  useful  vol 
umes.  1  am  sorry  to  say  that  Lowell  himself  did 
not  remember  whether  he  had  picked  if,  up  in 
conversation,  or  whether  lie  coined  it  in  ils  present 
form.  Kor  myself,  I  like  to  associate  it  with  him. 

I  find,  as  1  said,  1  am  always  reading  with  plea 
sure  his  estimate  of  his  own  Work  in  the  close  of  his 
life.  It  seems  to  mo  to  be  free  from  mock  modesty 
on  the  one  hand,  as  it  is  from  vanity  on  the  other, 
He,  seems  to  me  to  be  as  indifferent  about  style  as 
I  think  a  man  ou^'lit  to  be.  If  a  man  knows  he 
is  well  dressed,  he  had  better  not  recall  his  last 
conversation  with  his  tailor  ;  he  had  better  ^o  and 
come  and  do  his  duty.  Other  people  may  say  about 
the  dress  what  they  ehoose.  In  Lowell's  self-criti 
cism,  if  one  may  call  it  so,  you  see  the  same  frank 
ness  and  unconsciousness,  the  same  freedom  from 
conceit  of  any  kind,  which  you  see  in  those  early 
expressions  which  have  been  cited  as  illustrations 
of  his  hoy  hood  and  his  youth.  If  he  had  said  what 
he  wanted  to,  he  knew  he  had.  If  he  had  failed,  he 
knew  that.  Hut  it  seemed  to  him  almost  of  course 
(hat  if  a  man  knew  what  he  wanted  to  say  he  should 
be  al»le  to  say  it. 

One  wishes  that  (his  unconsciousness  of  method 
Could  work  itself  into  the  minds  of  literary  men 
more  often  and  more  thoroughly.  Let  a  man  eat, 
his  dinner  and  let  him  enjoy  it,  but  do  not  let  the 
guests  discuss  the  difference  between  the  taste  of 
red  pepper  and  of  black  pepper.  It  is  as  true  in 


274  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

literature  as  everywhere  else  that  the  life  is  more 
than  meat,  and  the  body  than  raiment.  There  will 
probably  be  sophists  and  critics  and  fencing-mas 
ters  and  dancing-masters  in  all  phases  of  society. 
They  will  certainly  give  much  pleasure  to  each 
other,  and  perhaps  they  will  give  pleasure  to  the 
world  ;  but  it  may  be  doubted  whether  they  will  be 
of  much  use  to  anybody.  I  suppose  Grant  enjoyed 
a  dress  parade  when  he  saw  it  well  done,  but  when 
they  asked  Grant  how  long  it  took  to  make  a  light 
infantryman,  he  said,  "  About  half  an  hour."  Let 
us  remember  this  as  we  listen,  a  little  bored,  to  what 
people  have  to  tell  us  about  style. 

There  are  some  curious  discussions  as  to  the 
places  and  the  duties  of  prose  and  of  poetry ;  what 
you  had  better  say  in  prose,  what  you  had  better 
say  in  verse.  But  I  am  disposed  to  think  that  such 
discussions  with  him  were  merely  matters  of  amuse 
ment  or  possible  speculation.  Everybody  who  is 
really  familiar  with  Lowell's  writing  will  remember 
many  passages  where  the  prose  may  be  said  to  be 
the  translation  of  his  own  poetry,  or  the  poetry  to 
be  the  translation  of  his  own  prose.  And  with  such 
training  as  his,  with  such  absolute  command  of  lan 
guage,  with  his  accurate  ear  and  perfect  sense  of 
rhythm,  it  would  be  of  course  that  he  should  "  lisp 
in  numbers,  for  the  numbers  came." 

To  the  very  end  of  his  life,  his  conversation,  and 
his  daily  walk  indeed,  were  swayed  by  the  extreme 
tenderness  for  the  feelings  of  others  which  his  sister 
noticed  when  he  was  a  little  boy.  He  would  not 
give  pain  if  he  could  help  it.  He  would  go  so  much 


fa^f 
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ELMWOOD, 
CAMBRIDGE,    MASS. 


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MR.  LOWELL   TO    DR.   HALE 


HOME  AGAIN  275 

more  than  halfway  in  trying  to  help  the  person  who 
was  next  him  that  he  would  permit  himself  to  be 
bored,  really  without  knowing  that  he  was  bored. 
He  would  overestimate,  as  good  men  and  great  men 
will,  the  abilities  of  those  with  whom  he  had  to  do. 
So  his  geese  were  sometimes  swans,  as  Mr.  Emer 
son's  were,  and  those  of  other  lovers  of  mankind. 

His  letters  are  never  more  interesting  than  in 
these  closing  years ;  and,  as  I  have  suggested,  the 
fun  of  his  conversation  sparkled  as  brightly  and 
happily  as  it  ever  did.  Mr.  Smalley,  in  an  amusing 
passage,  has  described  his  ultra-Americanism  in 
England.  A  pretty  Englishwoman  said,  "  Mr. 
Hawthorne  has  insulted  us  all  by  saying  that  all 
English  women  are  fat ;  but  while  Mr.  Lowell  is 
in  the  room  I  do  not  dare  say  that  all  American 
women  are  lean."  When  Lowell  came  home  he 
would  take  pleasure  in  snubbing  the  Anglomaniacs 
who  are  sometimes  found  in  New  England,  who 
want  to  show  by  their  pronunciation  or  the  choice 
of  their  words  that  they  have  crossed  the  ocean.  I 
think  that  every  one  who  is  still  living,  of  the  little 
dinner-party  where  he  tortured  one  of  these  younger 
men,  will  remember  the  fun  of  his  attacks.  This 
was  one  of  the  men  whom  you  run  against  every 
now  and  then,  who  thought  he  must  say  "  Brum 
magem"  because  Englishmen  said  so  a  hundred 
years  ago ;  and  on  this  occasion  he  was  taking  pains 
to  pronounce  the  word  "  clerk "  as  if  it  rhymed 
with  "  lark,"  —  "  as  she  is  spoken  in  England,  you 
know ! "  Lowell  just  pounced  upon  him  as  an 
eagle  might  pounce  on  a  lark,  to  ask  why  he  did  so, 


276  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

why,  if  it  were  our  fashion  to  pronounce  the  word 
"  as  she  is  spelled/'  we  might  not  do  so,  whether  on 
the  whole  this  were  not  the  old  pronunciation,  and 
so  on,  and  so  on. 

Never  was  anything  more  absurd  than  the  idea 
which  the  Irish  sympathizers  took  up,  that  a  resi 
dence  in  London  had  spoiled  his  fondness  for  the 
old  idioms  and  the  other  old  home  ways.  Indeed,  I 
think  his  stay  in  Southborough  was  specially  plea 
sant  to  him  because  he  learned  in  another  part  of 
Middlesex  County  how  to  renew  some  of  those 
studies  of  " Early  America"  which  he  had  begun 
before  he  knew  in  Cambridge. 

As  one  turns  over  the  volume  of  his  letters,  he 
finds  traces  of  the  fancies  which  shot  themselves  in 
a  wayward  fashion  into  his  conversation.  One  o£ 
the  fads  of  his  later  life  was  the  taking  up  of  the 
notion  which  we  generally  refer  to  Lord  Beacons- 
field,  that  almost  everything  remarkable  in  modern 
life  may  be  traced  back,  later  or  earlier,  to  a  Hebrew 
origin.  He  would  discourse  at  length  on  the 
Hebrew  traits  in  Browning,  and  he  affected  to  have 
discovered  the  line  of  genealogy  where,  a  century 
or  two  ago,  a  streak  of  the  blood  of  Abraham  came 
into  the  lines  of  the  Brownings.  He  was  quite  sure 
—  I  am  sorry  to  say  I  have  forgotten  how  —  that  he 
had  a  line  of  Jewish  blood  himself,  a  line  which  he 
could  trace  out  somewhere  this  side  of  the  times  of 
Ivanhoe.  Then  there  was  the  hereditary  descent  of 
his  mother's  family  from  the  Hebrides,  which  has 
been  referred  to.  The  Spences  were  of  Traill  ori 
gin,  —  his  brother  Robert  carried  the  Traill  name. 


HOME  AGAIN  277 

And  Lowell  liked  to  think  that  he  had  in  his  make-up 
something  of  the  element  which  in  a  Lochiel  you 
would  call  second-sight.  Sometimes  he  alludes  to 
that  in  his  letters ;  he  has  only  to  shut  his  eyes,  he 
says,  and  he  can  see  all  the  people  whom  he  has 
known,  whom  he  wants  to  see,  and  carry  on  his  con 
versation  with  them.  I  have  already  said  that  when 
I  painfully  worked  through  the  poems  of  James 
Russell,  our  James  Russell's  great-grandfather,  ren 
dering  that  homage  to  the  shade  of  that  poet  which 
no  one  else  has  rendered  for  a  hundred  years,  I  had 
to  remind  myself  that  he,  alas  !  had  no  second-sight, 
and  that  he  differed  from  his  great-grandson  pre 
cisely  in  this,  that  he  was  not  of  Norna's  blood  and 
could  not  work  Norna's  miracles. 

One  of  the  men  of  letters  whose  impressions  of 
such  a  life  every  one  is  glad  to  read  writes  to  me  of 
Lowell's  work  :  "  Mr.  Lowell  excelled  at  once  in  ori 
ginal  and  critical  work,  thus  giving  the  lie  to  the 
sneer  that  a  critic  is  a  person  who  has  failed  as  a 
creator.  Both  as  a  poet  and  an  essayist  he  revealed 
himself  as  a  genuine  cosmopolitan.  He  had  the  wis 
dom  of  the  scholar  and  the  horse  sense  of  the  man 
of  the  world.  He  was  equally  at  home  in  the  splen 
did  realm  of  the  imagination  and  in  the  prosaic 
domain  of  hard  facts ;  and  it  may  be  said  of  him, 
as  Macaulay  said  of  Bunyan,  that  he  gave  to  the 
abstract  the  interest  of  the  concrete.  As  a  satirist 
and  humorist  he  produced  in  the  'Biglow  Papers'  a 
work  which  is  unique  in  our  literature.  He  was  not 
given  to  moralizing ;  his  was  as  far  as  possible  from 
being  a  dull  didactic  brain  ;  but  all  to  which  he  put 


278  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

his  pen  was  wholesome  and  in  the  best  sense  stimu 
lating,  free  from  morbidness  and  that  pessimism  of 

<  John  P. 
Robinson,  he ' 

who  declared  that 

'  They  did  n't  know  everythin'  down  in  Judee.' " 

In  one  of  Lowell's  letters  written  to  England  after 
his  return  he  says  that  in  America  they  had  invented 
a  new  torture  while  he  was  away,  in  the  shape  of 
calling  upon  authors  to  read  their  own  works  aloud 
for  the  benefit  of  charities.  I  am  always  grateful 
to  this  form  of  torture  when  it  brings  as  agreeable 
compensation  as  I  remember  on  an  occasion  when 
we  were  both  reading,  I  think,  for  the  pleasure  of  an 
audience  which  had  contributed  to  the  purchase  of 
the  Longfellow  Park  at  Cambridge.  For  this  gave 
me  the  pleasure  of  talking  to  Lowell  for  the  two 
hours  while  the  "entertainment"  lasted,  as  we  sat 
upon  the  stage  in  the  Boston  Museum.  It  is  rather 
a  curious  thing,  to  a  person  as  little  used  to  a  stage 
as  I  am,  to  find  how  wholly  the  footlights  separate 
you,  not  simply  from  the  personal  touch  of  the  peo 
ple  in  the  audience,  but  from  them,  until  it  comes 
to  be  your  turn  to  address  them.  Even  at  a  public 
dinner,  when  you  sit  by  some  agreeable  person,  you 
have  not  exactly  the  chance  for  conversation  with 
him  which  you  have  when  both  of  you  are  in  mediae 
val  chairs  dug  out  from  the  property-room,  and  read 
ing  is  going  on  quite  in  front  of  you  which  you  may 
attend  to  or  not,  as  you  both  choose.  Of  course  the 
fortune  of  a  charity  was  made,  if  Lowell  were  willing 
to  read  poetry  or  prose  which  he  had  written. 


HOME  AGAIN  279 

As  the  reader  remembers,  he  lectured  again  in 
Boston  in  one  or  two  full  courses  to  large  audiences 
at  the  Lowell  Institute.  He  did  not  absolutely  re 
fuse  calls  from  distant  cities,  but  I  think  traveling 
became  somewhat  a  burden  to  him,  and  after  he  was 
once  in  Elmwood,  the  associations  of  the  old  books 
and  the  old  life  were  so  pleasant  that  it  was  more 
difficult  to  draw  him  away  from  home. 

For  his  summer  holiday,  however,  he  could  run 
across  the  ocean  and  visit  his  English  friends  in 
the  country,  or  go  back  to  his  pleasant  Whitby 
surroundings.  Whitby  had  for  him  a  particular 
charm,  and  one  really  wishes  that  he  had  been  in 
the  mood  at  some  time  to  make  a  monograph  on 
Whitby,  so  interesting  are  some  of  the  references 
which  he  makes  to  it  in  his  letters. 

"  I  am  really  at  Whitby,  whither  I  have  been 
every  summer  but  1885  for  the  last  six  years.  This 
will  tell  you  how  much  I  like  it.  A  very  primitive 
place  it  is,  and  the  manners  and  ways  of  its  people 
much  like  those  of  New  England.  The  people  with 
whom  I  lodge,  but  for  accent,  might  be  of  Ashfield. 
It  is  a  wonderfully  picturesque  place,  with  the 
bleaching  bones  of  its  Abbey  standing  aloof  on 
the  bluff  and  dominating  the  country  for  leagues. 
Once,  they  say,  the  monks  were  lords  as  far  as  they 
could  see.  The  skeleton  of  the  Abbey  still  lords  it 
over  the  landscape,  which  was  certainly  one  of  the 
richest  possessions  they  had,  for  there  never  was 
finer.  Sea  and  moor,  hill  and  dale ;  sea  dotted  with 
purple  sails  and  white  (fancy  mixes  a  little  in  the 
purple,  perhaps);  moors  flushed  with  heather  in 


280  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

blossom,  and  fields  yellow  with  corn,  and  the  dark 
heaps  of  trees  in  every  valley  blabbing  the  secret  of 
the  stream  that  fain  would  hide  to  escape  being  the 
drudge  of  man." 

We  shall  find  this  " hiding  of  the  stream"  again. 
"  I  know  not  why  wind  has  replaced  water  for  grind 
ing  ;  and  the  huge  water-wheels  green  with  moss  and 
motionless  give  one  a  sense  of  repose  after  toil  that 
to  a  lazy  man  like  me  is  full  of  comfort."  "I  wish 
you  could  see  the  '  yards/  steep  flights  of  stone  steps 
hurrying  down  from  the  west  cliff  and  the  east, 
between  which  the  river  whose  name  I  can  never 
remember  crawls  into  the  sea."  The  river  is  the  Esk 
River,  but  not  that  which  Lochinvar  swam  where 
"  ford  there  was  none." 

A  year  afterwards  Lowell  writes  from  Whitby : 
"I  am  rather  lame  to-day,  because  I  walked  too 
much  and  over  very  rough  paths  yesterday.  But 
how  could  I  help  it  ?  For  I  will  not  give  in  to  old 
age.  The  clouds  were  hanging  ominously  in  the 
northwest,  and  soon  it  began  to  rain  in  a  haphazard 
kind  of  way,  as  a  musician  who  lodges  over  one  lets 
his  fingers  idle  among  the  keys  before  he  settles 
down  to  the  serious  business  of  torture.  So  it  went 
on  drowsily,  but  with  telling  effects  of  damp,  till  we 
reached  Falling  Foss,  which  we  saw  as  a  sketch  in 
water-colors,  and  which  was  very  pretty. 

"Thunderstorms  loitered  about  over  the  valley 
like  'Arries  on  a  Bank  Holiday,  at  a  loss  what  to  do 
with  their  leisure,  but  ducking  us  now  and  then  by 
way  of  showing  their  good  humor.  However,  there 
were  parentheses  of  sunshine,  and  on  the  whole  it 
was  very  beautiful." 


HOME  AGAIN  281 

Again,  the  next  year,  in  1889,  he  says :  "  I  was 
received  with  enthusiasm  by  the  Misses  Galilee,  the 
landladies ;  they  vow  they  will  never  let  my  rooms 
so  long  as  there  is  any  chance  of  my  coming.  I 
like  it  as  much  as  ever.  I  never  weary  of  the  view 
from  my  window ;  the  Abbey  says  to  me,  c  The  best 
of  us  get  a  little  shaky  at  last,  and  there  get  to  be 
gaps  in  our  walls.'  And  then  the  churchyard  adds, 
( But  you  have  no  notion  what  good  beds  there  are 
at  my  inn — .'  The  mill  runs  no  longer,  but  the 
stream  does,  down  through  a  leafy  gorge  in  little 
cascades  and  swirls  and  quiet  pools  with  skyscapes 
in  them,  and  seems  happy  in  its  holiday."  We  shall 
come  to  this  "happy  holiday"  again.  Will  the 
reader  observe  that  it  is  of  a  series  of  summers 
spent  in  this  charming  retirement  at  Whitby,  that 
we  hear  people  speak  who  talk  of  his  summers  in 
England  as  if  the  grand  society  he  had  met  there 
had  spoiled  him  for  America. 

One  cannot  read  Lowell  for  five  minutes  without 
seeing  how  large  his  life  was,  and  how  little  he  was 
fettered  by  the  commonplace  gyves  of  space  or  time 
or  flesh  or  sense.  He  never  preaches  as  Dr.  Young 
would  do,  or  Mr.  Tupper,  or  Satan  Montgomery. 
But,  all  the  same,  he  is  living  in  the  larger  life,  and 
so  are  you  if  he  calls  you  into  his  company.  Writ 
ing  to  Miss  Norton,  he  says :  — 

"I  don't  care  where  the  notion  of  immortality 
came  from.  ...  It  is  there,  and  I  mean  to  hold 
it  fast.  Suppose  we  don't  know.  How  much  do 
we  know,  after  all  ?  .  .  .  The  last  time  I  was  ill,  I 
lost  all  consciousness  of  my  flesh.  I  was  dispersed 


282  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

through  space  in  some  inconceivable  fashion  and 
mixed  with  the  Milky  Way.  .  .  .  Yet  the  very  fact 
that  I  had  a  confused  consciousness  all  the  while  of 
the  Milky  Way  as  something  to  be  mingled  with, 
proved  that  I  was  there  as  much  an  individual  as 
ever. 

"  There  is  something  in  the  flesh  that  is  superior 
to  the  flesh,  something  that  can  in  finer  moments 
abolish  matter  and  pain.  And  it  is  to  this  we  must 
cling.  .  .  . 

"...  I  think  the  evolutionists  will  have  to  make 
a  fetich  of  their  protoplasm  before  long.  Such  a 
mush  seems  to  me  a  poor  substitute  for  the  rock  of 
ages,  by  which  I  understand  a  certain  set  of  higher 
instincts  which  mankind  have  found  solid  under  all 
weathers." 

If  I  am  writing  for  those  who  have  read  Lowell 
carefully  and  loyally,  they  know  that  he  knew  that 
"the  human  race  is  the  individual  of  which  differ 
ent  men  and  women  are  separate  cells  or  organs." 
They  know  that  he  knew  that  "  honor,  truth,  and 
justice  are  not  provincialisms  of  this  little  world," 
but  belong  to  the  life  and  language  of  the  universe. 
They  know  that  he  knew  that  he  belonged  to  the 
universe  and  was  the  infinite  child  of  the  infinite 
God.  He  says  sometimes  in  joke  that  he  hates  to 
go  to  church.  I  am  afraid  that  most  men  who  could 
preach  as  well  as  he  would  say  the  same  thing  with 
the  chances  of  the  ordinary  religious  service.  But 
he  also  says,  "  If  Dr.  Donne  or  Jeremy  Taylor,  or 
even  Dr.  South,  were  the  preacher,  perhaps  "  — 

As  it  happens,  I  recollect  no  expressions  of  his 


HOME  AGAIN  283 

more  enthusiastic  than  those  in  which  he  described 
public  services  of  religion.  His  mother  had  be 
longed  to  the  Church  of  England,  and  his  love  for 
the  Prayer  Book  was  associated  with  his  earliest 
recollections  of  her. 

For  the  rest,  I  am  sure  I  should  be  most  sorry 
to  have  any  one  think  that  a  man  of  his  large,  reli 
gious  nature,  who  lived  in  the  eternities,  could  be 
satisfied  with  the  average  ecclesiastical  function  of 
to-day. 

It  was  a  disappointment  to  him  that  his  health 
forbade  one  more  visit  to  his  dear  Whitby,  which  he 
had  proposed  for  the  summer  of  1890.  On  the  last 
day  of  his  last  visit  there,  as  I  suppose,  he  wrote  the 
beautiful  poem,  not  so  well  known  as  it  should  be, 
with  which  I  will  close  this  series  of  reminiscences. 
He  wrote  it  happily,  and  he  liked  it. 

It  begins  with  a  gay  description  of  the  flow  and 
joyous  dash  of  young  life.  As  time  passes  on,  the 
lively  brook  is  held  back  by  dams  sometimes ;  it  is 
set  to  work  to  feed  mankind,  or  to  help  men  some 
how;  it  is  pent  in  and  almost  prisoned.  But  not 
for  always.  Why  should  not  his  brook  burst  its 
bonds  and  leap  and  plash  and  sparkle  as  happily  as 
when  it  was  born  ? 

I  print  this  poem  because  the  circumstances  of  its 
composition  and  publication  prevented  its  insertion 
in  what  are  generally  spoken  of  as  the  complete  edi 
tions  edited  by  himself.  He  says  to  his  daughter, 
in  speaking  of  it,  "A  poem  got  itself  written  at 
Whitby  which  seems  to  be  not  altogether  bad ;  and 
this  intense  activity  of  the  brain  has  the  same  effect 


284  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

as  exercise  on  my  body,  and  somehow  braces  up  the 
whole  machine."  It  is  a  pleasure  to  feel  that  he 
read  this  beautiful  poem  himself  with  something  of 
the  satisfaction  which  every  one  will  find  in  it.  And 
it  is  impossible  that  it  should  not  suggest  the  condi 
tions  of  his  own  closing  life.  "  My  Brook/'  he  calls 
it.  And  one  need  not  run  back  to  the  memories  of 
"  Beaver  Brook "  to  fancy  the  walk  or  the  ride  in 
which  some  mountain  brook  in  the  North  Riding  re 
newed  the  old  Cambridge  experiences.  The  charm 
ing  brook  of  his  youth,  gay  and  joyous,  had  passed 
through  one  and  another  channel  of  hard  work  and 
of  close  discipline;  but,  as  he  says,  there  was  no 
reason  why,  as  he  and  his  brook  came  nearer  to  the 
ocean,  there  should  not  be  the  same  joy  and  free 
dom  that  there  was  when  he  and  his  brook  began 
on  life. 

Just  after  he  had  written  this  charming  poem  — 
better  than  that,  just  when  he  liked  it  —  it  happened 
that  he  received  an  earnest  request  from  that  excel 
lent  friend  of  literature,  Mr.  Robert  Bonner,  asking 
him  to  send  something  which  he  might  print.  On 
the  impulse  of  the  moment  Lowell  sent  this  poem. 
Mr.  Bonner  kept  it  for  illustration.  He  illustrated 
it  beautifully,  and  it  appeared  before  the  world  fif 
teen  months  after,  at  Christmas  of  the  year  1890,  in 
the  New  York  "  Ledger."  By  the  courtesy  of  Mr. 
Bonner's  sons,  I  am  able  to  print  it  all  —  as  the  fit 
close  of  these  papers.  I  could  not  otherwise  have 
given  so  charming  a  review  by  the  poet  of  his  own 
life  and  his  eternal  hopes. 


HOME  AGAIN  285 


MY  BROOK.1 

IT  was  far  up  the  valley  we  first  plighted  troth, 
When  the  hours  were  so  many,  the  duties  so  few  ; 

Earth's  burthen  weighs  wearily  now  on  us  both  — 
But  I  've  not  forgotten  those  dear  days  ;  have  you  ? 

Each  was  first-born  of  Eden,  a  morn  without  mate, 
And  the  bees  and  the  birds  and  the  butterflies  thought 

*T  was  the  one  perfect  day  ever  fashioned  by  fate, 
Nor  dreamed  the  sweet  wonder  for  us  two  was  wrought. 

I  loitered  beside  you  the  whole  summer  long, 

I  gave  you  a  life  from  the  waste-flow  of  mine  ; 
And  whether  you  babbled  or  crooned  me  a  song, 

I  listened  and  looked  till  my  pulses  ran  wine. 

*T  was  but  shutting  my  eyes  ;  I  could  see,  I  could  hear, 

How  you  danced  there,  my  nautch-girl,  'mid  flag-root  and  fern, 

While  the  flashing  tomauns  tinkled  joyous  and  clear 
On  the  slim  wrists  and  ankles  that  flashed  in  their  turn. 


Ah,  that  was  so  long  ago  !     Ages  it  seems, 

And,  now  I  return  sad  with  life  and  its  lore, 
Will  they  flee  my  gray  presence,  the  light-footed  dreams, 
And  Will-o'-Wisp  light  me  his  lantern  no  more  ? 

Where  the  bee's  hum  seemed  noisy  once,  all  was  so  still, 
And  the  hermit-thrush  nested  secure  of  her  lease, 

Now  whirr  the  world's  millstones  and  clacks  the  world's  mill 
No  fairy-gold  passes,  the  oracles  cease  ! 

The  life  that  I  dreamed  of  was  never  to  be, 
For  I  with  my  tribe  into  bondage  was  sold  ; 

And  the  sungleams  and  moongleams,  your  elf-gifts  to  me, 
The  miller  transmutes  into  work-a-day  gold. 


What  you  mint  for  the  miller  will  soon  melt  away  ; 
It  is  earthy,  and  earthy  good  only  it  buys, 

1  Copyright,  1890,  by  Robert  Bonner's  Sons. 


JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWZLL 

^ --I''-  ^  .-<:.-::*::.:•   :.:-.   ,v:-. 


Tk^ai^; 


I:--  I    ::—    :: 
icktev 

T:-_  «:  :ii  .  i 


^Oei 

?.::_, 


-:    -- 

•  hm 

::~vLff 

:  -•  -     :-.   :  :r 


~     '^  --i  ::!:-  I    - 

:  IT 


Far  we  Ve 


ria 


-:  :-  :--:  -:  :- 


ve  wffl, 

-^:   ;:  -.1, 


51  "  —7 


INDEX 


ABOLTTIOKISM,  51,  56,  60. 
Adams.  Charles  Francis,  his  opinion 
of  Spain,  216, 217  ;  member  of  the 
Saturday  Club.  202 ;   minister  to 
Spali. 
Adams.  President  John  Quiney.  his 

action  regarding  Cuba,  221. 
Adams.    SamueL    credits    Mayhew 
with  idea  of  colonial  federation,  9. 
Address   at   the    quarter-millennial 
celebration  of  Harvard,  by  J.  R. 
1^268. 

Admiralty  law.  i   - 
Advertiser.     See  Boston  Advertiser. 
Agassiz,  Louis,  lecturer  before  Low 
ell  Institute,  197-199;   professor 
at  Harvard.  197,  198,  268 ;  mem 
ber  of  the  Saturday  Club,  202. 
Aleott,  A.  Bronson,  43. 
Aldrich.  Thomas  Bailey,  editor  of 
The  Atlantic  Monthly.  149,  151 ; 
member  of    the   Saturday   Club, 
202. 

Alfonso  XII..  of  Spain,  216. 223.  224. 
Allen.  Thomas  J 
Allen   &   Ticknor.  booksellers,  65, 

155. 

Allston.  Washington,  friend  of  Dr. 
Charles  Lowell.   12  :  his  pictures 
in  Boston.  "  - 
Almakkari's  History,  translated  by 

Gavangos.  235. 

Alpha  Delta  Phi.  at  Harvard.  26-29 ; 
society  formed  at  Hamilton  Col 
lege.  N.  Y..  27. 

Amadeo.  ^™g  of  Spain,  abdication 
of,  208,  216. 


Amadis,18. 

American  Academy.  ". 

American  ministers  to  England.  239. 

Andrew,  Governor,  182,  202. 

.-,     -  -  -       •:    .- 

Anglomaniacs,  snubbed  by  J.  R.  L-, 
-" 

Anti-Slavery  Society.  173.  174. 

Anti-Slavery  Standard.  See  Na 
tional  Anti-Slavery  Standard, 

Appleton,  Thomas  Gold,  202,  266, 

"  Aretums,  The."  "-. 

Armstrong.  Governor.  155. 

Atlantic  Monthly,  The,  S3, 145, 150- 
152.  156-162,  165-167,  171,  179, 

n 

Atlas,  The  Boston,  edited  by  Richard 

Hildreth,69. 
AuWpine,  Monsieur  d',  nom  deplxme 

of  Hawthorne,  84. 

Bachi,  Retro,  professor  at  Harvard, 

Uft 

Bacon.  John,  26. 
Balliol    College.  Chford,  compared 

with  Harvard.  22. 
Ball's  Bluff,  battle  of. 
TTaMioft   George.  68, 152, 155.  2o9. 
•'Band    of    Brothers    and   Sbten, 

The,"  71,  72. 
Barrett.  Elizabeth.     S«  Browning. 

Elizabeth  Barrett. 
Barrows.  Mr.,  extracts  from  J.  R. 

L  s  letters  to,  242. 
Battle  of  the  Mle.  The  (son-     ' 
-  Barter's  Boys  They  Buih  a 


290 


INDEX 


Beaver  Brook,  177,  267,  284. 

Beecher,  Henry  Ward,  104. 

Beefsteak  Club,  126. 

Bellini,  Charles,  professor  of  modern 
languages  at  Harvard,  126. 

Bellows,  Henry  Whitney,  trained  in 
English  by  E.  T.  Channing,  19. 

Bells  and  Pomegranates,  85. 

Bible,  first  American,  154. 

Bigelow,  Jacob,  lectures  in  Boston, 
106. 

Biglow,  Hosea,  210,  211. 

Biglow  Papers,  44,  115,  124,  163, 
176,  177;  first  series,  popular  in 
England,  98,  99 ;  occasion  of,  162 ; 
second  series,  164,  167,  181 ;  criti 
cism  of,  277,  278. 

Birmingham  address.  See  Demo 
cracy. 

Blackwood  (magazine),  37,  82,  160. 

Blaine,  James  G.,  relations  with  J. 
R.  L.,  259. 

Blockade-running  during  the  Civil 
War,  218-220. 

Board  of  Fellows  of  Harvard  Uni 
versity,  15. 

Bonner,  Robert,  publishes  Lowell's 
poem,  My  Brook,  in  New  York 
Ledger,  284. 

Boston  Advertiser,  edited  by  Nathan 
Hale,  35,  79,  114;  publishes  J.  R. 
L.'s  lectures,  114. 

Boston  as  a  publishing  centre,  152, 
153. 

Boston  Athenaeum,  68,  152. 

Boston,  in  the  forties,  55-58 ;  changes 
in,  264,  265. 

Boston  Miscellany  of  Literature  and 
Fashion,  The,  29,  35,  82,  84-87, 
95,  147. 

Boston  Latin  School,  128,  182. 

Boston  Lyceum,  110. 

Boston  Public  Library,  66. 

Boston  "  school  of  history,"  68. 

Bowen,  Francis,  professor  at  Har 
vard,  50,  170. 

Bowker,  R.  R.,  257,  258. 


Bradbury  &  Soden,  publishers,  82, 

83. 

Braham,  John,  the  singer,  58. 
Briggs,  Charles  F.,  84, 176. 
Brooks,  Charles  T.,  44,  185. 
Brooks,  Phillips,  202. 
Browning,    Elizabeth    Barrett,    84, 

90. 

Browning,  Robert,  85,  258. 
Browning's  Hebrew  traits,  276. 
Brownson,  Orestes  A.,  57. 
Bryant,  William  Cullen,  97. 
Brunetti  Latini,  teacher  of  Dante, 

49. 
Buchanan,  James,   member   of  the 

Ostend  conference,  217. 
"  Buddha  of  the  West,"  203. 
Bunyan,  remark  of  Macaulay  con 
cerning,  277. 
Burnett,  Mabel  Lowell,  daughter  of 

J.  R.  L.,  143,  144,  188,  265,  267. 
"Byles,"    pseudonym    of   Edmund 

Quincy,  176. 

Cabot,  J.  Elliot,  member  of  the 
Saturday  Club,  157,  158,  202 ;  re 
mark  quoted,  203. 

Calderon,  Serafin  Estebanez  (the  po 
et),  J.  R.  L.'s  love  for,  271. 

Calderon  Collantes,  Fernando,  216. 

Calderon  de  la  Barca,  Madam,  gov 
erness  in  the  Spanish  royal  family, 
224,  225. 

Calderon  de  la  Barca,  Pedro,  224. 

Cambridgeport  Women's  Total  Ab 
stinence  Society,  111. 

Canovas,  Sefior,  227,  228. 

Carlyle,  his  books  reprinted  in  Amer 
ica  ;  their  influence  on  Lowell,  21 ; 
remark  on  Rousseau,  46 ;  his  pop 
ularity  in  Cambridge,  60,  61 ;  Lon 
don  lectures,  105,  106 ;  his  Chart 
ism,  136. 

Carpenter,  George  O.,  67. 

Carter,  James,  40. 

Carter,  Robert,  friend  of  J.  R.  L., 
86,  91,  114. 


INDEX 


291 


Cathedral,  The,  Emerson's  criticism 
of,  164. 

Changeling-,  The,  150. 

Channing,  Edward  Tyrrel,  professor 
at  Harvard,  18, 19,  21,  35, 41, 128; 
lectures  in  Boston,  67. 

Channing,  Walter,  22. 

Channing,  William  Ellery  (the 
younger),  43. 

Channing,  William  Francis,  aboli 
tionist,  22. 

Chase,  Thomas,  professor  at  Har 
vard,  170. 

Chapman,  Mrs.,  abolitionist,  175. 

Chauncy,  Charles,  president  of  Har 
vard,  194. 

Cheerful  Yesterdays,  100. 

Cherokee  warrior  of  Lowell's  class 
poem,  51. 

Child,  Francis  J.,  professor  at  Har 
vard,  170,  184-187;  his  War 
Songs  for  Freemen,  185,  186. 

Child,  Lydia  Maria,  contributor  to 
the  National  Anti-Slavery  Stand 
ard,  97,  98. 

Choate,  Joseph  H.,  40. 

Choate,  Rufus,  lectures  in  Boston, 
67  ;  J.  R.  L.'s  article  on,  166. 

Christian  Examiner,  152. 

Church,  the,  position  of,  on  the  is 
sues  between  North  and  South, 
100. 

Cincinnati  Public  Library,  Rufus 
King  a  founder  of,  32. 

Civil  Service  Reform,  261. 

Civil  War,  beginning  of,  180. 

Clarke,  James  Freeman,  his  classical 
scholarship,  14  ;  trained  in  Eng 
lish  by  E.  T.  Channing,  19 ;  mem 
ber  of  the  Saturday  Club,  202. 

Clarendon  Press,  Oxford,  254. 

Class  Day  at  Harvard,  39. 

Class  poem,  Lowell's,  51-53. 

Cleveland,  Grover,  elected  president, 
259 ;  does  not  retain  J.  R.  L.  as 
minister  to  England,  261. 

Cleveland,  Henry  Russell,  contribu 


tor  to  the  North  American  Re 
view,  61. 

Clough,  Arthur  Hugh,  in  Cambridge, 
135, 136 ;  acquaintance  with  Em 
erson,  136,  137. 

"Club,  The,  "71. 

"Coercion  Act, "243. 

Coleridge's  poems  published  in 
Philadelphia,  23. 

College  life  in  America  in  J.  R,  L.'s 
time,  127-131. 

College  societies  at  Harvard,  16. 

Commemoration  Ode,  8,  164;  de 
livery  of,  188-191. 

Commencement  dinners  at  Harvard, 
117. 

Commission  of  Thirty,  206. 

Concord,  Mass.,  scene  of  Lowell's 
"  rustication,"  43-54. 

Congregational  church,  schism  in, 
10. 

Constitution  of  the  United  States, 
celebration  of  the  adoption  of, 
268,  270;  J.  R.  L.'s  address,  269. 

Cooke,  George  Willis,  201. 

Cooke,  Josiah  Parsons,  professor  at 
Harvard,  170,  197. 

Coolidge,  James  Ivers  Trecothick, 
classmate  of  J.  R.  L.,  27,  32 ;  con 
tributor  to  Harvardiana,  36 ;  class 
orator,  39. 

Corner  Bookstore.  See  Old  Corner 
Bookstore. 

Cotton,  John,  103,  104. 

Courier,  The,  162. 

Craigie  House,  137. 

Crocker  &  Brewster,  publishers,  153, 
155. 

Cromwell's  Head,  sign  of,  65. 

Cuba,  negotiations  in  regard  to,  be 
tween  United  States  and  Spain, 
208,  217,  221,  227,  228. 

Cummings  &  Billiard,  publishers, 
155. 

Curtis,  George  Ticknor,  71. 

Cushing,  Caleb,  J.  R.  L.'s  article 
on,  166. 


292 


INDEX 


Ouster,  Gen.  George  A.,  182. 
Cutler,  Elbridge  Jefferson,  instructor 
at  Harvard,  132,  133,  135,  185. 

Daguerreotype,  announced  by  Da- 
guerre,  in  1839,  31. 

Daily  Advertiser.  See  Boston  Ad 
vertiser. 

Dallas,  George  M.,  156. 

Dana,  Richard  Henry,  president  of 
Phi  Beta  Kappa,  117;  member 
of  the  Saturday  Club,  202,  266; 
friend  of  J.  R.  L.,  253. 

Dana  Law  School,  183. 

Dante,  J.  R.  L.'s  lectures  on,  130, 
140, 142,  144. 

Dante,  quotation  from,  49. 

Death  of  Queen  Mercedes  (sonnet), 
233. 

Democracy,  Lowell's  address  at 
Birmingham,  237,  252,  253,  268. 

Democratic  Review,  Hawthorne's 
stories  in,  84. 

Dictionary  House,  255. 

Diplomatic  Correspondence,  edited 
by  Sparks,  69. 

Diplomatic  correspondence  of  J.  R. 
L.,  242-244. 

Donne,  Dr.,  282. 

Douglas,  Stephen  A.,  200. 

Dublin  University  Magazine,  160. 

Dunlap,  Frances.  See  Lowell,  Fran 
ces  Dunlap. 

Duyckinck,  E.  A.,  editor  of  The 
Arcturus,  84. 

Dwight,  John  Sullivan,  202. 

Ebeling  collection  of  early  American 
authorities,  68. 

Edinburgh  Review,  The,  62, 168,235. 

Election  in  November,  The,  171. 

Eliot,  Charles  William,  president  of 
Harvard,  40,  120,  129,  130,  170, 
193, 196,  202. 

Eliot,  Samuel,  his  classical  scholar 
ship,  14;  pupil  of  William  Wells, 
14. 


Elliott,  Dr.,  oculist,  89,  90. 

Ellis,  Rev.  Dr.  Rufus,  classmate  of 
J.  R.  L.,  32 ;  contributor  to  Har- 
vardiana,  36 ;  commencement  ora 
tor,  54. 

Ellsler,  Fanny,  58. 

Elmwood,  home  of  James  Russell 
Lowell's  family,  1 ;  occupied  by 
Thomas  Oliver  in  1774,  1 ;  confis 
cated  by  the  state  after  Oliver's 
departure,  2 ;  lived  in  by  Elbridge 
Gerry,  3 ;  used  as  a  hospital  dur 
ing  the  Revolution,  3  ;  description, 
3,  6,  11,  12;  occupied  by  J.  R.  L. 
after  his  marriage,  98,  126,  143, 
145, 150, 209 ;  return  to,  after  resi 
dence  abroad,  263-265,  267,270; 
Dr.  Hale's  last  visit  to  Dr.  Charles 
Lowell  there,  101 ;  birthplace  of 
James  Jackson  Lowell,  182. 

Emerson,  Ellen,  202. 

Emerson,  Ralph  Waldo,  trained  in 
English  by  E.  T.  Channing,  19; 
his  copy  of  Tennyson's  first  vol 
ume  of  poems,  21 ;  Lowell's  first 
acquaintance  with,  48,  49 ;  ad 
dress  before  Cambridge  divinity 
school,  48  ;  contributes  to  the 
North  American  Review,  61,  63  ; 
literary  work  as  a  profession,  63, 
64 ;  English  Traits,  sale  of,  63, 64 ; 
connection  with  Mr.  Phillips,  64  ; 
remarks  quoted,  69,  129 ;  lectures 
in  London,  105 ;  at  Dartmouth 
College,  108;  in  Boston,  59,  67, 
110 ;  friendship  with  Arthur  Hugh 
Clough,  136,  137;  publication  of 
books,  152 ;  member  of  the  Sat 
urday  Club,  157,  158;  English 
Traits,  63,  64,  154;  criticism  of 
Lowell's  The  Cathedral,  164;  Phi 
Beta  Kappa  addresses,  202-205 ; 
member  of  the  Saturday  Club, 
157,  201 ;  Bowdoin  prize  disserta 
tions,  202 ;  not  infallible  in  judg 
ing  character,  275. 

Emerson,  William,  202. 


INDEX 


293 


Emigrant  Aid  Company,  destruction 
of  hotel  of  the,  180. 

English  Traits,  sale  of,  63,  64. 

English  attitude  towards  America  in 
1863,  251. 

English  friends  and  acquaintances 
of  J.  R.  L.,  257-259. 

Esk  River,  280. 

Euripides,  128. 

Eustis,  Henry  Lawrence,  27. 

Eustis,  John  Fenwick,  26. 

Evarts,  William  M.,  214,  231,  239. 

Evening  Post,  edited  by  Bryant  and 
Gay,  177. 

Everett,  Alexander,  69, 152 ;  as  min 
ister  to  Spain,  offers  $100,000,000 
for  Cuba,  217;  remark  quoted, 
153. 

Everett,  Edward,  lectures  in  Boston, 
57,  67,  106 ;  author,  69,  152 ;  re 
mark  quoted,  128;  president  of 
Harvard,  133,  143 ;  his  opinion  of 
the  Transcendentalists,  203 ;  con 
gressman,  212  ;  opinion  of  Ameri 
can  enthusiasm  for  things  English, 
237 ;  minister  to  England,  239. 

Everett,  William,  40,  212. 

Fable  for  Critics,  58, 124, 163. 

Fair  Oaks,  battle  of,  183. 

Fantasy,  85. 

Federal  party,  17. 

Federation  of  colonies  suggested  by 

Mayhew,  9. 
Felton,  Cornelius  Conway,  president 

of    Harvard,    41,   129,  130,   134, 

170,  193,  194 ;  contributor  to  the 

North  American  Review,  61, 194 ; 

member  of    the  Saturday  Club, 

202. 

Fenians,  241. 
Field,  John  W.,  friend  of  J.  R.  L., 

253. 
Fields,  James  T.,  57,  65-67 ;  editor 

of  The   Atlantic    Monthly,   151, 

166;    bookseller    and    publisher, 

154, 155. 


Fields,  Osgood  &  Co.,  publishers, 
169. 

Fingal,  relation  to  Fenians,  241. 

First  Class  Book,  20. 

First  Snowfall,  The,  12, 150. 

Fish,  Hamilton,  instructions  to  Mr. 
Sickles  regarding  Spanish  affairs, 
208,  225. 

Fitful  Head,  The,  4. 

Five  of  Clubs,  The,  60. 

Flaxman's  pictures,  86. 

Forbes,  John  Murray,  202. 

Foreign  press  on  America,  209,  210. 

Fox,  Charles  James,  9. 

Franklin,  Benjamin,  minister  to 
France,  213. 

Frazer's  Magazine,  160. 

Frelinghuysen,  F.  T.,  letter  of  J.  R. 
L.  to,  244. 

French  travelers  in  America,  refer 
ence  to,  121. 

Frost,  Rev.  Barzillai,  Lowell's  tutor 
during  his  "  rustication,"  41,  43- 
47 ;  instructor  at  Harvard,  44. 

Frost,  Mrs.  Barzillai,  47. 

Fuller,  Margaret,  58. 

Gage,  General,  in  Boston,  2. 

Galilee,  the  Misses,  Whitby  land 
ladies,  281. 

Galignani's  newspaper,  209. 

Gardiner,  Colonel,  of  Preston  Pans, 
224. 

Garrison,  Wendell  Phillips,  272. 

Garrison,  William  Lloyd,  establishes 
the  Liberator,  56,  57,  174 ;  influ 
ence  as  a  lecturer,  101,  103,  104  ; 
reference  to,  by  J.  R.  L.,  175. 

Garrisonians,  173. 

Gay,  Sydney  Howard,  journalist  and 
historian,  97,  149,  173-179. 

Gayangos,  Pascual  de,  235,  236. 

George,  Henry,  arrested  in  Ireland, 
241. 

German  literature  at  Harvard,  19. 

Gerry,  Elbridge,  lived  atElmwood,  & 

Getting  Up,  85. 


294 


INDEX 


"  Giacopo  il  Rigiovinato,"  262. 

Gilder,  R.  W.,  262. 

Gladstone,  William  Ewart,  his  first 
knowledge  of  Emerson,  108; 
prime  minister,  249;  his  retire 
ment,  250. 

Godey's  Lady's  Book,  82. 

Gower,  Levison.  See  Granville,  Lord. 

Graham's  Magazine,  82. 

Grant,  U.  S.,  his  action  regarding 
Cuba,  221,  226  ;  anecdote  of,  274. 

Granville,  Lord,  association  with 
Lowell,  240,  241,  246-250. 

Gray,  Asa,  professor  at  Harvard,  196, 
197. 

"  Gray,  Billy,"  264. 

Greeley,  Horace,  editor  of  the  Trib 
une,  97,  175;  attitude  towards 
Lincoln,  178,  179. 

Greenleaf,  Simon,  professor  of  law 
at  Harvard,  32,  81. 

Guyot,  Arnold,  story  of  his  dinner 
party,  199. 

Hale,  Charles,  251. 

Hale,  Horatio,  member  of  Wilkes's 

exploring     expedition,     25,     26  ; 

prints  vocabulary  of  Micmac  In 
dian  language,  26,  27. 
Hale,  John  Parker,  minister  to  Spain, 

218. 
Hale,  Nathan,  Jr.,  at  Harvard,  27, 

29,  30;  editor,  35,36,  83-86,  114; 

member  of  the  "  Band,"  70,  73, 

74. 

Hale,  Sarah  Everett,  71,  72. 
Hall,  Newman,  194. 
Hancock,  Governor,  18. 
Hartington,  Lord,  248. 
Harris,  Clarendon,  154. 
Harrison,  President,  speech  at  New 

York,   at  the   centennial   of   the 

adoption  of  the  Constitution,  269, 

270. 
Hart, ,  referred  to  in  J.  R.  L.'s 

correspondence,  242. 
Hart,  Albert  B.,  review  of  diplo 


matic  relations  between  United 
States  and  Spain,  in  Harper's 
Monthly,  218,  221. 
Harvard  College,  sends  Pietas  et 
Gratulatio  to  George  IH.,  7 ;  life 
at,  15-26,  36  ;  library,  16,  68, 271  ; 
Phi  Beta  Kappa  and  Commence 
ment  dinners,  117;  modern  lan 
guage  work,  126, 127, 130;  growth 
of  the  college,  128-130,  133,  134, 
192 ;  professors  contemporary  with 
Lowell,  170 ;  quarter-millennial 
celebration,  198. 

Harvard  men  in  the  Civil  War,  180. 
Harvard  Society  of  Alumni,  J.  R. 

L.  president  of,  117. 
Harvardiana,  25,  29,  30,  35-39,  93, 
94 ;  Lowell  one  of  the  editors  of, 
25,  35-39. 

Haskell,  Daniel  N.,  67. 

Hawthorne,  Nathaniel,  in  Concord, 
43,  44 ;  in  Boston,  58 ;  a  contribu 
tor  to  the  Boston  Miscellany  of 
Literature  and  Fashion,  84  ;  pub 
lishes  books,  152 ;  member  of  the 
Saturday  Club,  202 ;  remark  on 
English  women,  275. 

Hayes,  Rutherford  B.,  elected  Pre 
sident,  212,  213  ;  appoints  J.  R.  L. 
minister  to  England,  234,  238. 

Hayward,  Charles,  one  of  the  editors 
cf  Harvardiana,  25-27. 

Heath,  Frank,  college  friend  of 
J.  R.  L.,  prominent  in  Confederate 
army,  95. 

Hebrew  origins  studied  by  J.  R.  L., 
276. 

Hecuba,  128. 

Hedge,  Dr.  F.  H.,  his  Phi  Beta 
Kappa  address,  128,  129 ;  contrib 
utor  to  War  Songs  for  Freemen, 
185. 

Hercules  and  the  Hydra,  211. 

Herder,  Johann  Gottfried  von,  46. 

Hermann,  Friedrich  B.  W.  von,  58. 

Higginson,  Thomas  Wentworth,  pu 
pil  of  William  Wells,  13;  his 


INDEX 


295 


classical  scholarship,  14;  trained 
in  English  by  E.  T.  Channing,  19 ; 
Cheerful  Yesterdays,  100  ;  a  con 
tributor  to  The  Atlantic  Monthly, 
166. 

Hildreth,  Richard,  historian,  69, 
152. 

Hildreth,  Samuel  Tenney,  one  of 
the  editors  of  Harvardiana,  25- 
27. 

Hill,  Thomas,  president  of  Harvard, 
129,  130,  134,  193,  194-196. 

Hillard,  George  Stillman,  contribu 
tor  to  North  American  Review, 
61. 

Billiard  &  Gray,  publishers,  153, 
155. 

Historical  Society,  library  of,  68. 

Hoar,  George  Frisbie,  202. 

Hoar,  Judge,  president  of  Phi  Beta 
Kappa,  117 ;  member  of  the  Satur 
day  Club,  202. 

Hoar  family,  in  Concord,  44. 

Hoffman,  August  Heinrich,  46. 

Holden,  Mr.,  122. 

Holmes,  John,  his  classical  scholar 
ship,  14,  188,  266. 

Holmes,  Oliver  Wendell,  pupil  of 
William  Wells,  13 ;  classical  schol 
arship,  14;  trained  in  English  by 
E.  T.  Channing,  19 ;  after-dinner 
speaker,  40;  heard  in  public  in 
Boston  in  the  40's,  57,  67 ;  note 
to  J.  R.  L.  quoted,  118, 119  ;  mem 
ber  of  the  Saturday  Club,  157, 
158,  201  ;  referred  to  in  speaking 
of  the  Atlantic,  160;  My  Hunt 
after  the  Captain,  161 ;  the  Au 
tocrat,  165 ;  contributor  to  War 
Songs  for  Freemen,  185;  calls 
Emerson  the  Buddha  of  the  West, 
203  ;  later  companionship  with  J. 
R.  L.,  266. 

"Hospital  for  Incurable  Children" 
(anecdote),  263. 

Hotel  France  et  Lorraine,  Lowell's 
home  in  Paris,  206,  207. 


House  of  Commons,  visited  by 
Charles  Lowell,  19. 

Howe,  Dr.  and  Mrs.  Estes,  145, 
266. 

Howe,  Mrs.  Julia  Ward,  185,  186. 

Howells,  William  Dean,  contributor 
to  and  editor  of  The  Atlantic 
Monthly,  151  ;  contributor  to  the 
North  American,  169 ;  member 
of  the  Saturday  Club,  202. 

Hughes,  Thomas,  friend  of  J.  R.  L. 
and  guest  at  Elmwood,  258,  259. 

Hughes,  Mrs.  Thomas,  259. 

Hunt,  William  Morris,  202. 

Hunter,  Mrs.  Leo,  257. 

Hutten,  Heinrich  von,  member  of 
Kossuth's  suite,  138;  translates 
Uncle  Tom's  Cabin  into  German, 
138. 

Hutten,  Ulrich  von,  138. 

Immortality,  Lowell's  belief  in,  281, 
282. 

In  Memoriam,  published  by  Ticknor 
&  Fields,  65  ;  anecdote  concern 
ing,  65,  66. 

Independent  in  Politics,  The,  ad 
dress  before  New  York  Reform 
Club,  270. 

Inglis,  Fanny.  See  Calderou  de  la 
Barca,  Madam. 

Irish-Americans  not  satisfied  with 
J.  R.  L.  as  minister  to  England, 
238. 

Irish  sympathizers'  criticism  of  J.  R. 
L.,  276. 

Irving,  Washington,  minister  to 
Spain,  213. 

Isabella  II.,  of  Spain,  220. 

Jackson,  Judge,  58. 

James,  Henry,  202. 

Jefferson,  Thomas,  hated  by  Josiah 
Quincy,  18 ;  at  William  and  Mary's 
College,  126. 

Jennison,  James,  professor  at  Har 
vard,  170. 


INDEX 


Jewish  strain  in  Lowell  family,  276. 
Jowett,  Life  of,  22 ;  his  opinion  of 

sermons,  99. 

July  reviewed  by  September,  171. 
Jungfrau,  first  ascent  of,  by  Agassiz, 

198. 

Kansas,  struggle  for  freedom  of, 
101,  171,  218. 

Keats,  John,  his  poems,  published 
in  Philadelphia,  23;  J.  R.  L.'s 
admiration  of,  89. 

King,  Augusta  Gilman,  71,  72. 

King,  Caroline  Howard,  71. 

King,  John  Gallison,  friend  of  J.  R. 
L.,  70,  74,  79. 

King,  John  Glen,  distinguished  law 
yer,  79. 

King,  Rufus,  at  Harvard,  27,  29- 
33,  35,  36 ;  lawyer  and  citizen  of 
eminence  in  Cincinnati,  31,  32 ; 
member  of  the  Constitutional  Con 
vention  of  Ohio,  32 ;  Dean  of  the 
Faculty  of  the  Cincinnati  Law 
School,  32 ;  contributor  to  Har- 
vardiana,  36. 

King,  Rufus  (the  elder),  leader  of 
Federalist  party,  31. 

King,  Thomas  Starr,  settles  in  Bos 
ton,  67  ;  bright  sayings,  106,  107. 

"King's  Arms,  The, "74. 

Knickerbocker  Magazine,  82,  83, 
160. 

Koerner,  Gustav,  minister  to  Spain, 
218. 

Lane,  General,  183. 

Lane,  George  M.,  professor  at  Har 
vard,  170. 

Lass  of  the  Pamunky,  The,  186. 

Laud,  Bishop,  103,  104. 

Lawrence,  Abbott,  minister  to  Eng 
land,  239. 

Lawrence,  Amos  Adams,  anecdote 
of,  264. 

Lecture  system.  See  Lyceum  system. 

Ledger.  See  New  York  Ledger,  284. 


Leland,  Charles  Godfrey,  186. 

Leland,  Henry  Perry,  186. 

Lexington,  battle  of,  2. 

Liberator,  The,  56,  174. 

Liberty  Bell,  The,  97-101. 

Libraries  in  Boston  before  1850,  66, 
68. 

Lilliburlero,  186. 

Lilliput  circle  of  Boston  and  Cam 
bridge,  51. 

Lincoln,  Abraham,  172,  178,  200, 
201,  218. 

Lincoln,  Robert,  reminiscence  of 
Lowell,  142,  143 ;  anecdote  of  his 
entrance  to  Harvard,  200,  201. 

Lippitt,  George  Warren,  at  Harvard, 
27,  29,  30,  35,  36 ;  secretary  of 
legation  at  Vienna,  29  ;  Unitarian 
preacher,  32,  33. 

Literary  Messenger,  The,  82. 

Lochinvar,  280. 

London  Quarterly  Review,  The,  62, 
168. 

Longfellow,  Henry  Wadsworth, 
"Smith  professor"  at  Harvard, 
19-21,  40,  41,  128,  130;  contribu 
tor  to  the  North  American  Re 
view,  61,  62;  succeeded  in  his 
professorship  by  J.  R.  L.,  127; 
friendship  with  J.  R.  L.,  135,  137 ; 
kindness  to  Heinrich  von  Hutten, 
138,  144;  member  of  the  Satur 
day  Club,  157,  202;  contributor 
to  the  Atlantic,  165,  166;  anec 
dote  of,  187 ;  dies  during  J.  R. 
L.'s  residence  in  England,  266. 

Longfellow,  Samuel,  31. 

Longfellow  Park,  278. 

Loring,  Caleb  Williams,  161. 

Loring,  Charles  Greeley,  Boston 
lawyer,  81. 

Loring,  Frederick  Wadsworth,  131, 
132,  185. 

Loring,  George  Bailey,  intimate 
friend  of  J.  R.  L.,  36,  58,  80  ;  con 
tributor  to  Harvardiana,  36,  109, 
132. 


INDEX 


297 


Louis  Napoleon.     See  Napoleon  III. 

Lovering,  Joseph,  professor  at  Har 
vard,  134,  170. 

Lowell,  A.  Lawrence,  extracts  from, 
and  references  to,  his  memoir  of 
J.  R.  L.,  149,  162-164,  172,  210, 
260,  270. 

Lowell,  Blanche,  daughter  of  J.  R. 
L.,  149. 

Lowell,  Charles,  brother  of  J.  R.  L., 
12. 

Lowell,  Charles,  father  of  J.  R.  L., 
minister  of  West  Church,  Boston, 
1,  6-12,  53,  54,  96,  101. 

Lowell,  Charles  Russell,  nephew 
of  J.  R.  L.,  killed  during  the 
Civil  War,  180-182. 

Lowell,  Frances  Dunlap,  wife  of  J. 
R.  L.,  145,  205,  207,  208, 234,  235, 
240,  241,  259,  260. 

Lowell,  Francis  Cabot,  founder  of 
the  city  of  Lowell,  7. 

Lowell,  Harriet  Spence,  mother  of 
J.  R.  L.,  3,  4,  276,  283. 

Lowell,  James  Jackson,  nephew  of 
J.  R.  L.,  killed  during  the  Civil 
War,  180-184. 

Lowell,  James  Russell,  parentage, 
1,3;  boyhood,  1,3-5,  11-14; 
early  views  on  slavery,  8  ;  college 
days,  15-21 ;  one  of  the  editors  of 
Harvardiana,  25,  35 ;  member  of 
Alpha  Delta  Phi,  27 ;  early  poems, 
30,  34,  39;  appointed  class  poet, 
39 ;  "  rusticated  "  in  consequence  of 
indifference  to  college  rules,  40, 
41 ;  stay  at  Concord,  43-54  ;  class 
poem,  50-53  ;  choice  of  a  profes 
sion,  58,  59,  69  ;  intimate  friends 
70-77  ;  abandons  law  for  litera 
ture,  81,  82,  85  ;  a  contributor  to 
The  Boston  Miscellany  of  Litera 
ture  and  Fashion,  35,  82-86  ;  with 
Robert  Carter  establishes  The 
Pioneer,  which  dies  after  three 
months,  86-91 ;  goes  to  New  York 
for  treatment  of  his  eyes,  88-90  ; 


marries  Maria  White,  1844,  92  ; 
publishes  A  Year's  Life,  1841,  93, 
94;  spends  winter  of  1844-45  in 
Philadelphia,  96 ;  writes  for  The 
Liberty  Bell  and  the  National 
Anti-Slavery  Standard,  97, 98, 173, 
175;  publishes  The  Biglow  Pa 
pers,  first  series,  98 ;  lectures  in 
behalf  of  the  anti-slavery  and 
temperance  reforms,  and  on  liter 
ary  subjects,  100,  101,  109-117; 
gives  Lowell  Institute  course,  112- 
117 ;  president  of  the  Harvard  So 
ciety  of  Alumni,  117-121 ;  pre 
sident  of  the  Phi  Beta  Kappa  of 
Cambridge,  117-121 ;  death  of  Mrs. 
Lowell,  125  ;  goes  to  Europe,  125 ; 
"Smith  professor"  at  Harvard, 
125,  127,  130,  132-135,  137-139, 
141-144,  164,  170,  171, 193-201  ; 
marries  Miss  Frances  Dunlap, 
145 ;  editorial  work,  145-169, 179, 
180;  member  of  the  Saturday 
Club,  157,  158,  201 ;  goes  abroad, 
163;  political  essays,  171,  175; 
contributor  to  the  National  Anti- 
Slavery  Standard,  175-177 ;  losses 
of  relatives  in  the  Civil  War,  180  ; 
visits  Paris,  205-208 ;  Rome,  209 ; 
returns  to  Elmwood,  209;  his 
stand  in  political  matters,  211 ; 
presidential  elector,  212,  213; 
offered  several  foreign  missions, 
appointed  to  Spain,  192,  213,  214  ; 
difficulties  of  the  position,  215- 
221, 225  ;  life  in  Madrid,  228-234  ; 
transferred  to  England,  234  ;  life 
in  London,  238-261 ;  death  of  the 
second  Mrs.  Lowell,  241,  259; 
tour  on  the  Continent,  253  ;  returns 
to  America,  261,  262 ;  last  years, 
262-284;  public  addresses  and 
readings,  266, 269,  278,  279 ;  Low 
ell  Institute  lectures,  270,  279; 
later  literary  work,  270,  271 ;  ety 
mological  study,  271,  272 ;  death, 
262. 


INDEX 


Lowell,  John,  minister  at  Newbury- 

port,  6. 

Lowell,  John  [2d],  judge,  6,  7  ;  his 
opposition  to  slavery,  6 ;  a  verse- 
writer,  7. 

Lowell,  John  [3d],  founder  of  the 
Lowell  Institute,  7,  9,  112,  113. 

Lowell,  John,  judge,  great  grandson 
of  John  Lowell  [2d]  above,  202. 

Lowell,  John  Amory,  197. 

Lowell,  Mabel.  See  Burnett,  Mabel 
Lowell. 

Lowell,  Maria  White,  wife  of  J.  R. 
L.,  71, 72, 75,  76, 78, 86, 87, 91-93 ; 
writes  for  The  Liberty  Bell  and 
National  Anti-Slavery  Standard, 
97 ;  death  of,  125,  163. 

Lowell,  Mary.  See  Putnam,  Mary 
Lowell. 

Lowell,  Percival,  7. 

Lowell,  Rebecca,  sister  of  J.  R.  L., 
11. 

Lowell,  Robert  Traill  Spence,  bro 
ther  of  J.  R.  L.,  11,  267,  276. 

Lowell,  Rose,  daughter  of  J.  R.  L., 
149,  163. 

Lowell,  Walter,  son  of  J.  R.  L.,  163. 

Lowell,  William,  brother  of  J.  R. 
L.,  11,  12. 

Lowell  factory  girls,  83. 

Lowell  Institute,  the,  7,  66,  67,  112, 
113 ;  lectures  before,  by  J.  R.  L., 
112,  113,  270,  279. 

"  Lyceum  system,"  99, 100, 102-110, 
112,  152;  influence  of,  in  develop 
ing  anti-slavery  sentiment,  104. 

Lyman,  Mrs.,  Life  of,  167. 

Lyttelton,  Lady,  friend  of  J.  R.  L. 
and  Mrs.  L., 

Macaulay,  T.  B.,  remark  on  Bun- 
yan,  277. 

Macaulay's  History,  published  in 
Boston,  156. 

Man  without  a  Country,  The,  pub 
lished  in  The  Atlantic  Monthly, 
161,  162. 


Mann,  Horace,  194. 
Mansfield,  Lord,  decision  of,  in  re- 
gard  to  slavery  in  England  (Som 
erset  case),  6. 

Mason,  John  Y.,  member  of  the  Os- 
tend  conference,  217. 

Mason  and  Slidell,  J.  R.  L.'s  writing 
concerning,  260. 

Massachusetts  Bay  Colony,  102,  103. 

Massachusetts  Bill  of  Rights,  anti- 
slavery  clauses,  6,  8. 

Massachusetts  Historical  Society, 
68,  110,  152. 

Massachusetts  Society  for  Diffusing 
Useful  Knowledge,  110. 

Mayhew,  Thomas,  pastor  of  West 
Church,  first  suggested  federation 
of  American  colonies,  9. 

McClellan,  Gen.  George  B.,  181. 

McCoil,  Fein,  241. 

Mclnerny,  John,  Irish  suspect,  244.' 

McLeod,  Mrs.,  teacher  in'  Boston, 
224. 

McMicken  bequest,  32. 

Mead,  Edwin  D.,  article  on  the  Pio 
neer,  87,  88. 

Mechanics'  Association,  110. 

Mechanics'  Institutes,  105. 

Memorial  Hall,  Cambridge,  118. 

Mercantile  Library  Association,  66, 
67,  110. 

Mercedes,  queen  of  Alphonso  XII. 
232,  233. 

Mexican  War,  162. 

Miller,  William,  Second  Adventist, 
57. 

Minister's  position  in  New  England 
in  the  18th  century,  9. 

Miscellany,  The  Boston.  See  Bos 
ton  Miscellany  of  Literature  and 
Fashion. 

Missouri  Compromise,  8,  96. 

Modern  language  instruction  at  Har 
vard,  15,  126,  130;  at  William 
and  Mary's,  126. 

Modoc  Indians,  210. 

Monroe,  James,  publisher,  154. 


INDEX 


299 


Montgomery,  Robert,  281. 

Monthly  Anthology,  The,  62,  152. 

Montpensier,  Duchess  of,  219. 

Morris,  Gouverneur,  opinion  of,  on 
the  Union,  18. 

Morse,  John  T.,  jr.,  his  Life  of  Dr. 
Holmes,  11,  201. 

Mosby,  Colonel,  182. 

Motley,  John  Lothrop,  publishes 
Merrymount,  69;  member  of  the 
Saturday  Club,  157,  158,  202; 
contributor  to  the  Atlantic,  165, 
166;  the  North  American,  169; 
minister  to  Austria,  213 ;  to  Eng 
land,  239 ;  anecdote  of,  263. 

Moxon,  Edward,  85. 

Murray's  Dictionary,  253-257,  272. 

Music  (poem),  12. 

"Mutual  Admiration  Society,"  57, 
59-66,  134, 169. 

My  Brook,  284-286. 

My  First  Client,  80,  85. 

Napoleon  III.  (Louis  Charles  Napo 
leon  Bonaparte),  his  action  during 
the  American  Civil  War,  218-220: 

Nation,  The,  occasion  of  its  com 
position,  210. 

National  Anti-Slavery  Standard,  97, 
101, 149,  163,  171-179. 

Natural  History  Society  at  Harvard, 
foundation  of,  23. 

New  England  Emigrant  Aid  Com 
pany,  212. 

New  England  Magazine,  first,  82 ; 
present  series,  87,  201. 

New  Tariff  Bill,  The,  171. 

New  York  Ledger,  284. 

New  York  Reform  Club,  270. 

New  York  Tribune,  The,  during  the 
Civil  War,  175-179. 

Niagara,  described  by  Rev.  Barzil- 
lai  Frost,  45. 

"Nightingale  in  the  Study,  The," 
271. 

Nolan,  Philip,  217. 

Norna,  4,  277. 


North  American  Review,  early  char 
acter  and  influence  of,  59-64,  82, 
152,  167,  168  ;  edited  by  Palfrey, 
59-61 ;  by  Edward  and  Alexan 
der  Everett,  62,  63;  by  Lowell 
and  Norton,  145,  167-169,  171, 
179. 

North,  Christopher,  37. 

Norton,  Caroline,  188. 

Norton,  Grace,  letters  to,  229,  281. 

Norton,  Charles  Eliot,  friend  of  J. 
R.  L.  and  editor  of  his  letters,  33, 
78,  80,  122,  135,  265,  266 ;  editor, 
with  J.  R.  L.,  of  the  North  Ameri 
can  Review,  151,  168,  169 ;  mem 
ber  of  the  Saturday  Club,  202. 

Ode,  85,  86. 

Odeon,  57. 

Old  and  New,  edited  by  Nathan 
Hale,  35;  by  E.  E.  Hale,  164, 
216. 

Old  Corner  Bookstore,  57,  64,  66. 

Old  English  Dramatists,  first  draft 
of,  29;  published  in  Boston  Mis 
cellany,  85 ;  reception  by  the 
press,  92  ;  later  series,  270,  279. 

Oliver,  Thomas,  lieutenant-governor 
of  Massachusetts,  lives  at  Elm- 
wood  in  1774,  1 ;  resigns  his  com 
mission,  2. 

Oriental  Society,  235. 

Ostend,  conference  at,  217. 

Oxford  Dictionary.  See  Murray's 
Dictionary. 

Page,  William,  73,  266. 

Paine,  John  Knowles,  189. 

Palfrey,  John  Gorham,  member  of 
Harvard  divinity  faculty,  editor  of 
the  North  American  Review,  59- 
61  ;  reads  Carlyle's  French  Revo 
lution,  61 ;  remark  quoted,  68 ; 
devotes  himself  to  historical  work, 
69. 

Palmerston,  Lord,  249. 

Parker,  Theodore,  lectures  in  Bos- 


300 


INDEX 


ton  and  elsewhere,  101,  103,  104, 
106. 

Parkman,  Francis,  202. 

Parsons,  T.  W.,  57. 

Payne,  John  Howard,  diplomatic 
correspondence  concerning  final 
disposition  of  his  remains,  245- 
247. 

Peabody,  Andrew  Preston,  acting 
president  of  Harvard,  196. 

Peabody,  Elizabeth,  58,  84. 

Peirce,  Benjamin,  professor  at  Har 
vard,  24,  41, 128,  134. 

Peirce,  James  Mills,  professor  at 
Harvard,  170,  202. 

Perkins,  Colonel,  264. 

Perry,  Horatio,  secretary  of  Ameri 
can  Legation  at  Madrid,  219. 

Perseus  and  the  dragon,  211. 

Phi  Beta  Kappa  dinners  at  Harvard, 
40,  117,  203. 

Phi  Beta  Kappa  fraternity,  27;  J. 
R.  L.,  president  of  Cambridge 
chapter,  117;  Dr.  Hedge's  ad 
dress,  128. 

Philippines,  the,  159. 

Philistinism,  211. 

Phillips,  Moses  Dresser,  publisher. 
See  Phillips  &  Sampson. 

Phillips,  Wendell,  57 ;  as  a  lecturer, 
101,  103,  104,  106,  108. 

Phillips  &  Sampson,  publishers,  64, 
150-159. 

Philological  Society  undertakes  a 
dictionary,  254. 

Photography,  invention  of,  31 ;  first 
photograph  taken  in  New  Eng 
land,  31. 

Pickens-and-Stealin's  Rebellion, 
The,  171. 

Pickering  correspondence,  217. 

Pierce,  Franklin,  administration  of, 
180,  218. 

Pierce,  John,  of  Brookline,  10. 

Pierpont,  John,  174. 

Pietas  et  Gratulatio,  7. 

Pillsbury,  Parker,  103. 


Pioneer,  The,  established  by  Lowell 

and  Robert  Carter,  86-91, 95,  147, 

149. 

Polk,  James  K.,  156,  217. 
Portfolio,  The,  82. 
Power  of  Music,  The,  13. 
Power  of  Sound,  The,  121-123. 
Prescott,  William  Hickling,  69, 152, 

159;  contributor  to  the  Atlantic, 

165, 166 ;  member  of  the  Saturday 

Club,  202. 

Present  Crisis,  The,  150. 
President's  Policy,  The,  171. 
Prose  and  poetry,  Lowell's  use  of, 

274. 
Publishing  houses  in  Boston,   152- 

157. 
Putnam,    Mary    Lowell,    sister    of 

J.  R.  L.,  4,  5,  11, 12,  266. 
Putnam,   William   Lowell,   nephew 

of  J.   R.   L.,   killed   during  the 

Civil  War,  180,  181,  184,  185. 

Quarter  -  Millennial  celebration  at 
Harvard,  198,  268. 

Question  of  the  Hour,  The,  171. 

Quincy,  Edmund,  176. 

Quincy,  Josiah,  president  of  Har 
vard,  15,  17,  18,  40,  41,  125,  133, 
192,  193;  mayor  of  Boston,  17, 
18 ;  belief  in  guidance  of  a  u  Dai- 
mon,"  18. 

Randolph,  John,  defied  by  Josiah 
Quincy,  18. 

Rebellion,  The,  its  Causes  and  Con 
sequences,  171. 

Reconstruction,  171. 

Reno,  General,  181. 

Renouf,  Edward  Augustus,  class 
mate  of  J.  R.  L.,  32. 

Riano,  Don  Juan,  archaeologist,  236. 

Riverside  Press,  165. 

Rogers,  Nathaniel  P.,  editor  of  the 
National  Anti-Slavery  Standard, 
173,  174. 

Rousseau,  Jean  Jacques,  46. 


INDEX 


301 


"Row  up,"  47. 

Kowfant    Club,    Cleveland, 

limited  edition  of  Lowell's  first 
course  of  Lowell  Institute  lec 
tures,  114. 

Royal  Library  at  Madrid,  127. 

Russell,  Francis  Lowell  Button,  180. 

Russell,  James,  great-grandfather 
of  J.  R.  L.,  7,  277. 

RusseU,  Lord  John,  249. 

Russell,  Warren  Dutton,  180. 

Sagasta,  Spanish  premier,  222,  223. 

St.  John  in  Patmos,  44. 

Salamanca,  General,  227. 

Salignac's  drill  corps,  184. 

Sampson,  Charles,  publisher,  153, 
154. 

Santiago  de  Cuba,  225. 

Saturday  Club ;  first  dinner-party, 
156, 157 ;  history  and  membership, 
201,  202,  266. 

Sawyer,  Warren,  67. 

Saxton,  General,  187. 

Scates,  Charles  Woodman,  at  Har 
vard,  27,  29,  30,  35,  36  ;  lawyer  in 
Carolina,  29 ;  friend  of  J.  R.  L., 
33,  50. 

Schmitt,  Captain,  183. 

Scotch  the  Snake  or  Kill  it  ?  171. 

Second-sight  possessed  by  J.  R.  L., 
3,  4,  277. 

Sedgwick,  Mrs.  T.,  186. 

Serenade,  The,  74,  75. 

Shelley's  poems  published  in  Phila 
delphia,  23. 

Shepherd  of  King  Admetus,  The, 
85. 

Sheridan,  Richard  Brinsley,  9. 

Sickles,  D.  E.,  208,  225. 

Silliman,  Benjamin,  57. 

Sixth  Massachusetts  Regiment  in 
Baltimore,  181. 

Skillygolee,  37. 

Skillygoliana,  37,  38. 

Slattery,  John,  Irish  suspect,  244. 

Slaves  freed  in  Massachusetts,  6. 


Smalley,  George  W.,  on  J.  R.  L.  as 

minister  to  England,  252,  260,  261, 
275. 

Smith,  Abiel,  benefactor  of  Har 
vard,  125, 126. 

Smith,  Adam,  126. 

Smith  professorship  at  Harvard,  19, 
20,  126, 127, 130. 

Societies  at  Harvard,  16,  26-29. 

Somerset  case.  See  Mansfield,  Lord, 
6. 

Sonnet  to  Keats,  85. 

Sophocles,  Professor,  170. 

Soule",  Pierre,  minister  to  Spain,  217, 
218. 

South,  Dr.,  282. 

Southborough,  J.  R.  L.'s  residence 
in,  265,  276. 

Southern  Literary  Magazine,  82. 

Spain,  American  relations  with,  208, 
215-221,  225-228. 

Spanish  people,  222,  230,  231. 

Sparks,  Jared,  president  of  Harvard, 
41,  69, 129,  130,  133,  152,  193. 

Spectator,  The,  quoted,  260. 

Spence  family,  J.  R.  L.'s  maternal 
ancestors,  3,  276. 

Star  Chamber,  104. 

Stearns,  Elijah  Wyman,  50. 

Stearns,  Edward,  67. 

Stedman,  Edmund  C.,  169. 

Stephen,  Leslie,  180,  181. 

Sterling,  John,  106. 

Story,  Judge  Joseph,  professor  of 
law  at  Harvard,  32,  81. 

Story,  Mary,  71,  72. 

Story,  William  Wetmore,  classmate 
of  Lowell  and  Dr.  Hale,  23 ;  visits 
West  Point,  23;  assists  Nathan 
Hale  in  the  Boston  Miscellany, 
35  ;  contributes  to  Harvardiana, 
36 ;  member  of  "  The  Band,"  70, 
74,  76;  legal  work,  79;  with 
Lowell  in  Rome,  163,  209 ;  work 
as  a  sculptor,  209 ;  later  meet 
ing  with  Lowell,  253 ;  separation} 
266. 


802 


INDEX 


Stowe,    Calvin  Ellis,    anecdote  of 
187. 

Stowe,  Harriet  Beecher,  83. 

Strauss's  Leben  Jesu,  59. 

Summer  Shower,  poem  by  Longf el 
low,  20. 

Sumner,  Charles,  his  classical  schol 
arship,  14 ;  trained  in  English  by 
E.  T.  Channing,  19;  contributor 
to  North  American  Review,  61 
lectiires  in  Boston,  67 ;  member 
of  the  Saturday  Club,  202. 

Supreme  Court  of  Mass,  frees  slaves 
6. 

Taylor,  Jeremy,  282. 

Tacitus,  Wells's  edition  of,  printed 

in  Cambridge,  13. 
Talbot,  William  H.  Fox,  inventor  of 

photography,  31. 
Tempora  Mutantur,  occasion  of  its 

composition,  210. 

Tennyson's  poems  at  Harvard,  21. 
Texas,  annexation  of,  96. 
Thayer,  J.  B.,  40. 
Thiers.  President,  Lowell's  judgment 

of,  206. 
Thomas,   Isaiah,   publisher    of  the 

first  American  Bible,  154. 
Thoreau,  Henry  D.,  at  Harvard,  25 ; 

in  Concord.  43,  44. 
Thorndike.    Israel,    benefactor     of 

Harvard.  68. 

"Three  Thousand  New  England 
Clergymen,"  memorial  addressed 
to,  101. 

Thursday  lecture,  103. 
Ticknor,  George,  first  "  Smith  pro 
fessor  "     at     Harvard,    20,    126, 
127. 
Ticknor   &  Fields,  booksellers,  65, 

154,  155. 

Tilden,  Samuel  J.,  212,  213. 
Times,  The  London,  209,  210. 
To  Lamartine,  177. 
To  Perdita  Singing,  85. 
Tory  refugees,  1. 


Traill,  Mary,  grandmother  of  J.  R. 
L.,3. 

Traill,  Robert,  of  Orkney,  great 
grandfather  of  J.  R.  L.,  3. 

Traill  family,  ancestors  of  J.  R.  L, 
3,  276. 

Transcendentalists,  202,  203. 

Tread  well,  Daniel,  instructor  in 
science  at  Harvard,  23. 

Trench,  Dean.  254. 

Tribune.     See  New  York  Tribune. 

Trimmers,  Miss,  11. 

Troil,  Minna,  3. 

Tuckerman.  Jane  Frances,  72. 

Tucker-man.  John  Francis,  72,  74. 

Tudor,  William,  58,  264. 

Tupper,  Martin,  281. 

Turgot,  Soule"s  duel  with,  217. 

Two,  The,  85. 

Tyler,  John,  President  of  the  U.  S., 
his  position  on  the  annexation  of 
Texas,  96;  his  third  veto,  111. 

Ultra- Americanism  of  Lowell,  275. 

Uncle  Tom's  Cabin  translated  into 
German,  138. 

Undergraduates'  attitude  toward  in 
structors,  140,  141. 

Underwood,  F.  H.,  157,  159. 

University  Hall,  Harvard  College, 
on  title-page  of  Harvardiana,  37. 

University  of  Cincinnati,  foundation 
of,  32. 

Ursuline  Convent,  Charlestown,  78. 

Useful  Knowledge  Society,  105. 

Vallandigham,  Clement  Laird,  162. 
Virginius  massacre.  208,  225. 
Virtuoso's  Collection,  A. 
Vision  of  Sir  Launfal,  The,  163. 
'  Voluntaries ' '  at  Harvard,  15. 

Walker,  James,   president  of   Har 
vard,  57,  133,  134,  170,  193,  200. 
Walpole,  Horace,  63. 
Ware,  Henry,  lectures  in  Boston,  106, 
War  Song-s  for  Freemen,  165, 


INDEX 


303 


Warren,  George,  67. 

Washburn,  Edward  A.,  classmate  of 
J.  R.  L.,  32 ;  contributor  to  Har- 
vardiana,  36. 

Washington  in  Cambridge,  3  ;  visits 
Boston  in  1792,  18;  visits  Gov 
ernor  Shirley  in  Boston  in  1756, 
65. 

Webster,  Daniel,  57,  59,  67. 

Webster's  Dictionary,  motto  of,  272, 
273. 

Weekly  Pasquil,  176. 

Wells,  William,  teacher  of  J.  R.  L., 
13. 

Welsh,  John,  minister  to  England, 
239. 

Wendell,  Barrett,  his  paper  on  Low 
ell,  139,  140. 

West  Church,  Boston,  9,  11. 

West  Indies  in  the  Civil  War,  218- 
220. 

West  Point,  visit  to,  23. 

What  is  there  in  the  Midnight 
Breeze  ?  hitherto  unpublished 
poem  by  J.  R.  L.,  34,  35. 

Wheeler,  Charles  Stearns,  one  of 
the  editors  of  Harvardiana,  25- 
27. 

Whipple,  Edwin  P.,  67,  158,  202. 


Whitby,  a  favorite  resort  of  J.  R.  L., 

240,  279-281,  283. 
White,  Maria.     See   Lowell,   Maria 

White. 
White,  William  Abijah,  brother  of 

Maria  White  Lowell,  70,  74,  78, 

79. 
White,  William  Orne,  his  classical 

scholarship,  14. 
Whitman,  Walt,  84. 
Whittier,  John  G.,  202. 
Wilberforce,  William,  9. 
Wilbur,  Parson,  44,  45. 
Williams,  Henry,  27. 
Willis,  N.  P.,  his  criticism  of  Lowell 

as  an  editor,  88,  148;  as  a  poet, 

90. 

Wilson,  Henry,  175,  179. 
Winthrop,  John,  160. 
Winthrop,  Robert  C.,  67. 
Winthrop,    Theodore,    killed    near 

Hampton,  161 ;    a  contributor  to 

The  Atlantic  Monthly,  161. 
World's  Fair,  The  (poem),  210. 
Worthington,  Governor,  of  Ohio,  31. 

"Yankee  Plato,"  203. 
Year's  Life,  A,  12,  74,  93-95. 
Young,  Edward,  281. 


CAMBRIDGE  .  MASSACHUSETTS 
U   .   S   .  A 


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